21 ms·

Apology

256 points by tiagoleifert 5y ago

Animats 5y ago
This is about something that happened in 2018?
- lucasmullens 5y ago
  The blog post this is in response to was posted in June 2021.
- crackercrews 5y ago
  It relates to this discussion on Racket, [1] which was on HN yesterday. 1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27531508 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27531508
- cpach 5y ago
  Yes it is. It’s new information to most people though.
- lucideer 5y ago
  It sounds like the author is trying to make out that it's about something that happened in 2018, but the original post he's responding to was pretty clearly about a lot more.
MaxBarraclough 5y ago
Context: Why I no longer contribute to Racket. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27531508 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27531508
- LAC-Tech 5y ago
  I really think people need to learn to push back, and talk plainly. This could have easily been a blog called "that time Felleisen was being a cunt and I told him to go fuck himself" and been 1/4 the length.
  - piercebot 5y ago
    I'm not sure I would classify that as "talking plainly." Words like that would put anybody on the defensive, and being on the defensive does not make people receptive to positive change.
  - qbasic_forever 5y ago
    There are very real cultural differences and taboos against questioning and pushing back against authority. What one culture may view as normal and expected process in improvement, another is horrified and ashamed to consider. Do not assume just because you've grown up or grown accustomed to it that it's 'normal' or practiced everywhere. This is perhaps one of the biggest frictions I see in teams that are full of folks from different cultures and backgrounds.
    - neolog 5y ago
      Where do people stay silent for so long? [Edit: rephrased]
      - williamsmj 5y ago
        Hierarchies. The answer to your question is: hierarchies.
        neolog 5y ago
        This is a good answer, thanks.
        gautamcgoel 5y ago
        /s
      - qbasic_forever 5y ago
        Did you read the original blog post? They clearly mention at the end they posted it because they were repeatedly asked why they disengaged from the Racket community: "Why mention any of this now? Two reasons. Over the last year, friends in the Racket community have asked me why I’ve reduced my involvement. Absent anything else, they assume the most obvious reason: that I’m bored or frustrated with Racket as a language. That I’ve moved on to other things. Not true. On the contrary, it seems important to reassert: I like almost everything about Racket. It’s still my favorite programming environment. I use it almost every day. I wish I could still contribute the way I did before. But I can’t subject myself to more of the same. In that sense, it feels more like exile than withdrawal. I’ve been involved with FOSS projects for nearly 25 years. A project that depends on free contributions of time & effort—as every FOSS project does—needs to be an appealing place for others to make gifts of their time. Sure, in any community of opinionated humans, occasional frictions and disagreements are natural. But Felleisen’s outrageous hostility went far beyond anything I’d experienced." Also this main issue occurred three years ago. It is very odd to assume that someone decided to just sit on an issue for three years and then suddenly gotcha throw it out of nowhere. This person was bullied out of the Racket community. They quietly left rather than try to fight against aggressive personalities. That's the real story here, and what happens in 99% of similar incidents.
- chronogram 5y ago
  So both just needed to talk to each other? No idea why they have to go through HN proxies.
  - mvid 5y ago
    Matthew made it pretty clear he had talked to a number of people, and waited months before going public
    - bobthechef 5y ago
      But did he speak with Matthias directly first? There is an adult way to escalate problems which is to first speak privately with the person in question to address the problem or correct the misunderstanding. If that fails, you could speak with people in the relevant social circle shared with Matthias. Dragging your problem into the public square is only something you do if those fail AND there are sufficiently good reasons to make it public. Just to be clear: I am not defending or criticizing Matthias one way or another. I am speaking purely about process. This is a process that should be observed equally by those in positions of leadership toward those whom they serve in that role as well as the later toward the former. That is, both Matthias and Matthew.
      - fatbird 5y ago
        This is one way to handle the problem, but certainly not the only way, and not a way that is blessed as "the mature solution". There are a variety of legtimate reasons not try to speak first privately to Matthias. Butterick gets at one of them in his essay, namely that allowing bullies to keep their bullying private has the effect of isolating other victims and preventing more coherent responses to it by a group.
      - JohnHaugeland 5y ago
        Instead of "just asking questions," then using that to make commentary that doesn't make sense because you don't know what's happening, try becoming familiar with the situation
      - 5y ago
- threatofrain 5y ago
  Discussion on Lobsters. https://lobste.rs/s/6rnyn9/why_i_no_longer_contribute_racket https://lobste.rs/s/6rnyn9/why_i_no_longer_contribute_racket
  - LAC-Tech 5y ago
    Thanks for this public service announcement to never go on lobsters. Wow.
  - wchar_t 5y ago
    Why did you consider it necessary to link there? I'm genuinely curious.
    - chris_wot 5y ago
      It is also linked on the "Why I no longer contribute to Racket".
- IncRnd 5y ago
  Thank you. That references the blog at https://beautifulracket.com/appendix/why-i-no-longer-contribute-to-racket.html https://beautifulracket.com/appendix/why-i-no-longer-contrib.... At the beginning: "No facts were disputed. The incidents were numerous, happening over a period of years. They were always witnessed by others on the Racket core team. For that reason, there’s no need to enumerate the details now. Though I will give one example as illustration" If there was no need to enumerate details, why did he write an additional 12 pages in a blog post? This whole incident, whatever it was or is, seems like two personalities with egos that won't stop. That's not something I care about.
- nerdponx 5y ago
  Wild. Where were the other people in the room? This sounds like shared (ir)responsibility beyond the individual with the bad attitude.
  - ljm 5y ago
    This was my take on it. It could be that literally everyone on the leadership team was terrified into conformity, but I find that hard to believe, and that instead it was more of an inner-sanctum that held some admiration for the leader who let them in.
- itronitron 5y ago
  Seems like an appropriate time to fork the project.
fungiblecog 5y ago
Yeah, yeah. We always get the inevitable apology. Actions not words, please.
- plorkyeran 5y ago
  This is an actual apology that unambiguously admits he was in the wrong, and that's not at all inevitable. An apology is only the first step, but this is a good example of what that first step should look like.
  - yawaramin 5y ago
    It's really not. What a real apology should have looked like: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27545116 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27545116
howolduis 5y ago
apology? nothing of what I read sounds like an apology. You basically said that your friends told you that what you did looked bad, and based on that, you feel sorry that he "felt" hurt. Then go on saying how good and gracious you were to him? c'mon... edit: typo
- barnabees 5y ago
  If this isn't a real apology then what would you say a real apology looks like? Of the many public apologies I've read in the past this reads like an honest, genuine one. He admitted guilt, explained what he did wrong and did not try to justify it, and clearly stated that he apologizes. What's missing?
  - williamsmj 5y ago
    I have no doubt it is honest, but it's not a good apology. He barely remembers the specific incident (by his own admission). That's not his fault, but it makes the apology pretty much meaningless. He seems to assume he was a bit of a grumpy-puss that day, and that "jaded" their subsequent interactions. This is incredibly glib and diminishes the specific incident. But more importantly, he never admits to being a bully. The original post gives this incident as an example of a pattern of abusive behavior. He sidesteps that entirely.
    - whatshisface 5y ago
      What's a bully? Someone who loses their temper? Someone who's scary and makes enemies more easily than friends? I think a bully is someone who uses intimidation to get their way, if someone intimidates random bystanders what they have is a need to work on their emotional self-control.
      - neolog 5y ago
        It's more like someone who habitually uses power in a mean way.
williamsmj 5y ago
tldr: "I barely remember the specific incident you cited merely as an example of an ongoing pattern of absuive behavior, but it sounds like I was a jerk that day. Oops! We good?"
- wpietri 5y ago
  Well put. And to me that's one of the horrors of abusers. I believe they really don't remember the details of the incidents. For them it's a momentary way to feel good. For the victims, it sticks with them for months, years, decades.
DJBunnies 5y ago
Took a hard cs course with fellisen at NU. Dude is ignorant to his toxic behavior, preaching egoless programming while being needlessly cruel during graded presentations. I know many cs folks at NU refused to take his classes.
- encryptluks2 5y ago
  Is this #metoo all over again? Must be thousands of victims all over the place just now willing to speak up cause someone published a blog without actually providing any proof.
- qez 5y ago
  And I know many more who sought out his class.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
- nefitty 5y ago
  I got curious and checked his rate my professor profile. People either loved his class or hated his behavior. Sometimes both.
- fighterpilot 5y ago
  I worked for one of these types many labelled an asshole and grew to love it, and he had the most loyal group of people around him you could imagine. There's a super important distinction between the person with extremely high standards that skewers anything mediocre and that can legitimately be won over by doing exceptional work (my old boss), and the narcissist who is critical for the mere purposes of bullying (or the type that mixes both of those together). If the rage and ultra high standards are strictly about work quality and vary only along that dimension, then that's someone I actually really like working with.
  - dboreham 5y ago
    You sir were a flying monkey.
mirthflat83 5y ago
tldr: “I can’t remember clearly but think I had a bad day, sorry dude lol”
jtbayly 5y ago
Summary of several HN replies: “Yeah, yeah, whatever. Saying you’re sorry doesn’t cut it. You need to pay for it before we will accept your apology.” Hence, cancel culture. Edit: There’s no need to therefor assume the dude is totally changed based on one apology, but good grief people. The lesson I’m learning here is, “Never apologize. It will do no good and will simply drag the situation out longer.”
- spoonjim 5y ago
  Well if saying “sorry” provides one with complete absolution then what’s the real cost of acting badly?
  - jtbayly 5y ago
    Who said it absolves him? The question is why attack him for apologizing?
    - williamsmj 5y ago
      Because the apology is so shallow and glib and self-serving that it's literally worse than no apology.
      - teddyh 5y ago
        It might be a bad and insufficient apology, but people always say that, about all apologies, even honest and good ones. A more workable policy would be to never criticize apologies, but accept them and move on. You never want to make apologizing a sure-losing move.
        spoonjim 5y ago
        Yes, but the apology should not affect the likelihood of being punished. If you do something bad, apologizing shouldn't be a ticket out of punishment.
  - neolog 5y ago
dog_boy 5y ago
this response absolutely sucks shit
jwcacces 5y ago
The only one who can judge the worthiness of this apology is Matthew Butterick himself. As for me, this sounds like the first steps of the self realization process Matthias should go through in an effort to better himself. Let's not judge it to harshly. Rather let's encourage him to keep on walking down that path of self improvement that we all should be on.
- boredtofears 5y ago
  > first steps of the self realization process Every time I see a well written apology letter, I cringe at all the self-actualization rhetoric people respond to it with. As if they must do more and become some kind of Buddhist monk before true retribution is to be awarded to them.
  - throwaway9980 5y ago
    Yes, I agree that we can all do better, be better, strive for good things for all, etc, but this language borders on religious. And it’s everywhere these days. It’s as if not always living up to a set of ideals is the modern original sin that requires constant atonement.
    - itronitron 5y ago
      Many people have been conditioned to believe that people in positions of power are virtuous, and that they reached that position by doing good things well. It's not that everyone expects people in power to live a set of ideals, it's that they have been marketed as such.
  - vanderZwan 5y ago
    The apology is in response to being called out on one example in decades of behavior so toxic that a significant number of people have left academia, an otherwise amazing open source project and who knows what else, as a result of it. This has been confirmed by many people at this point. An apology in that context is a starting point, a request to open a door that has been shut by the abuser themselves. An apology doesn't actually fix anything regarding the toxic behavior, and not getting the benefit of doubt that ths behavior, again, with a track record of decades, is suddenly over is not just completely justified, it would be naive to do otherwise. And to think that this kind of hesitance at trusting someone who has so systemically violated it for. decades. has anything to do with "awarding retribution" or "becoming like a Buddhist monk" is incredibly tone deaf.
ashton314 5y ago
A culture that holds individuals accountable must also be forgiving of human foibles—especially with sincere apologies. It’s refreshing to see two adults acting like it: Matthew limited his criticism to what was relevant, and Matthias responded promptly, politely, and apologetically. Both stances take humility and wisdom.
- howolduis 5y ago
  he never responded to what mattered to Matthew though. He responded to one specific instance and not the overall problem.
neolog 5y ago
An apology is a good first step and I'm glad he's taken it. There are several remaining steps, including gathering feedback, developing an improvement plan, and implementing it. I hope Felleisen will take these steps too.
- shkkmo 5y ago
  Precisely this. I did get the feeling that the appology was heartfelt. I also felt the appology failed to recognize the that the complaint was about a sustained set of issues and not a one time incident. The lack of any discussion of what Fellleisen and Racket will try to do going forward was glaringly missing, particularly becuase Felleisen couldn't independently identify the mistakes that he made and required outside observers to understand where the person he bullied was comming from. I feel like a lot of damage would have been minimized if there had been people in that meeting who had made clear how out-of-line the behavior was immediately so that Felleisen could have immediately addressed the issue and hopefully learned from it.
Causality1 5y ago
Does Matthias really believe we're so naive as to think this attempt to cover for a career of toxic and abusive behavior by apologizing for a single incident is going to work? It's the oldest trick in the bully playbook. Technically speaking, apologizing to him is better than not apologizing to him, but it does nothing to make other people more willing to work with you.
aaomidi 5y ago
Starting with an excuse for the behavior is not a good way to do an apology.
- CharlesW 5y ago
  Except that he does not start with that — he starts with an unequivocal apology. As someone with no skin in the game and who doesn't know these people, it sounds like he's trying to explain why he didn't realize sooner that he was such a raging asshole to Matthew. (I understand that Mattias apparently has a history of this kind of behavior that this apology does not address.)
  - wpietri 5y ago
    I read it as justification, which is typical in half-assed apologies. If that were the only flaw, I might call it a reasonable mistake. But given the other issues (failure to look at pattern, failure to work toward preventing similar future issues, failure to make amends), I think that's too generous a reading. To me it looks like part of a pattern.
- qez 5y ago
  I think you read the blog post in the wrong order. The apology is on line 3.
  - shkkmo 5y ago
    The way the appology is set to the right does make it easy to accidentally skip past.
fastasucan 5y ago
Doesn't sit right that he is so focused on the one example of what was supposed to be lot of bad behaviour over time. From the first blogpost/accusation it was clearly a personality problem, however here it is treated as a singular episode.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- chris_wot 5y ago
  It appears there are a lot of people who say otherwise.
faitswulff 5y ago
> …I even proposed [Butterick] could replace me. I always thought that your experience and your outside view would seriously improve our work. I still think so. That would be an interesting turn of events.
xwdv 5y ago
Bad move on his part. No public apology ever makes a positive difference. It only draws attention to yourself. People’s thirst for social justice cannot be quenched.
nubb 5y ago
I’m so surprised at the vitriol in these comments. He spoke to others about the situation and apologized. What more can a person do?
- wpietri 5y ago
  What more can a person do? Just off the top of my head: He could have addressed the full substance of the blog post, which was a pattern of "intentional, personalized abuse and bullying" with "incidents were numerous, happening over a period of years". He could have used this incident to reflect on his broader behavior not just toward this one person but more generally. He could have talked the steps he was taking to make sure he did less harm in the future. He could have asked for forgiveness. He could have offered to make amends to Matthew Butterick, to repair the relationship. He could have recognized that this harmed not just Butterick, but the broader community around the project. He could ask that community for help identifying other times he was abusive. He could apologize for that too and work to make amends there as well. He could have addressed this bit: "Nor did any member of Racket’s core team hold him to account. Everyone just shrugged and moved on. I was encouraged to do the same." In particular, he could recognize that he was part of a social structure that not only accepted abusive behavior but actually enabled it. Once recognizing that, he could work to change the system such that abusive behavior was no longer tolerated. And that's off the top of my head.
  - neolog 5y ago
    Good answer. Though "ask for forgiveness" seems like a specific cultural/quasireligious thing that not everybody assigns meaning to.
    - wpietri 5y ago
      In the sense of asking forgiveness from $DEITY, sure. But in the sense of saying to the person harmed, "Please forgive me," I think it's very broad.
      - neolog 5y ago
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
YuriNiyazov 5y ago
@dang could we please unflag this? If the original message stayed up and was not flagged, this should remain too.
- gautamcgoel 5y ago
  Dumb question: does the @ actually do anything on HN?
  - detaro 5y ago
    no
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - yjftsjthsd-h 5y ago
    No, and mods have indicated that email is better IIRC.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - YuriNiyazov 5y ago
    No; it's just that "dang" it's also a word in English, so the "@" is there to disambiguate.
yellow_lead 5y ago
I'm curious why this was flagged. If the discussion yesterday didn't break HN rules, I'm not sure why the response would. I suppose both of them technically fall into "off-topic" discussion though.
- DoreenMichele 5y ago
  Flags are from users. So to some extent it's random personal opinion and unless you identified all individuals who flagged it and asked them why?, you aren't going to actually know, though it is fairly common for someone to give their opinion about why they think it was likely flagged (and sometimes I appreciate their observations and sometimes I'm kind of like "That's just your opinion, man!").
  - tinco 5y ago
    My finger was hovering over the flag button for a while. I was following the discussion and for the first hour or so the comments were of ridiculously low quality. I think of the first 20 comments less than 5 had positive score. I was thinking of flagging it because I just didn't see how any good discussion could form on it. I didn't flag because it seemed like the post itself had relevance.
    - DoreenMichele 5y ago
      Thank you for your comment. It's rare for me to flag something. I usually try to leave a good faith comment if it seems worth discussing and the initial comments are sucky. I'm not saying that's some kind of "right" way to handle it. That's just how I behave -- or try to behave -- and there are myriad factors that influence those choices. I'm just talking here.
- dang 5y ago
  Possibly some readers are tired of the repetition, and they're not wrong [1] - that's why we downweight follow-up stories [2]. However, we make exceptions when there's significant new information (SNI) [3], which basically amounts to: is there enough of a diff [4] from the previous thread to support a substantially new discussion? In this case I'd say you could call it either way: the fact that Felleisen apologized is significant new information but on the other hand the thread is...of the second freshness. I've turned off the flags for now. [1] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=curiosity%20repetition%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so... [2] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=follow-up%20by%3Adang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor... [3] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=%22significant%20new%20information%22%20by%3Adang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so... [4] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=diffs%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...
gautamcgoel 5y ago
Why is this flagged?? It seems very relevant to the HN community. You can't allow the criticism post to stay up and attract hundreds of comments and then flag the apology post.
secnono 5y ago
The classic "I'm sorry, but" Not a real apology, nor real regret, merely self serving fodder.
ltbarcly3 5y ago
So now we have to issue formal apologies when someone decides to attack us in public for being rude to them years earlier? Are people made of wet tissue paper, unable to move on after someone wasn't nice to them years ago?
- ltbarcly3 5y ago
  So people are modding down my comment above. I feel attacked, and I insist each person who downvoted my comment formally apologize for this unproductive negative feedback.
throw3456548 5y ago
Huh. It's interesting to see this come out now. Years ago I was planning on entering a PL PhD program until I met Felleisen. He yelled at me, insulted me, and I left nearly crying. That was the last straw that led to me leave academia, and I never came back. A young woman I know switched out of her computer science major after taking his class and said she still had nightmares about him. Another person I know worked with him on a project as a student and said half the team dropped out due to his behavior. He would call the remaining team at 2am or 3am to yell at them sometimes (according to my friend). I'm not sure how I feel about this coming out. I don't get the feeling that he's doing this on purpose. I've heard from people close to him that that's just the way he is and you have to get used to it. At the same time, he's been making people feel like shit for decades. Academia used to be a place for misfits who don't understand social conventions. What if not understanding social conventions comes off to others as bullying, though? Racket could be better off without him. He might be brilliant, but he is so difficult to work with, he hurts his own project.
- EGreg 5y ago
  I met Richard Stallman’s lawyer several years ago, having made an appointment with him to discuss our open source framework, Qbix. Eben Moglen had a nice office near Lincoln Center in NYC. Somehow on the way to the office, he had taken a look at our site and mistook something on it... by the time I arrived, he spent the entire time yelling at me and berating whatever he could find out about me. A very strange character. Having said that, he did help me find out what I was after: how to make sure large corporations wouldn’t use my open source code while smaller ones could — we should use Affero GPL. So, all in all it was a productive meeting. But still, it was pretty surreal. Apparently he has done it with other people too: https://observer.com/2011/12/in-which-eben-moglen-like-legit-yells-at-me-for-being-on-facebook-2/ https://observer.com/2011/12/in-which-eben-moglen-like-legit... There is more to this. A couple years prior he had encouraged four NYU students to start Diaspora, a similar project to ours...
  - NtochkaNzvanova 5y ago
    Sounds like a difficult experience for you, but the other example you cite (https://observer.com/2011/12/in-which-eben-moglen-like-legit-yells-at-me-for-being-on-facebook-2/ https://observer.com/2011/12/in-which-eben-moglen-like-legit...) does not seem to reinforce your point that he's some sort of abusive individual. It belongs on one of those "Journalists Posting Their Ls" accounts on Twitter. The author comes off as an utter dolt, while Moglen's position is well-reasoned. It's hard to comprehend why some people are so allergic to the entire notion of personal responsibility; that changing the world starts with changing your behavior, not just bleating about it online and waiting for some regulator to fix your problems (whose incentives are likely not aligned with yours anyway).
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
mark_l_watson 5y ago
I thought that was a good apology and I hope that it gives Matthew closure and a peaceful heart over this whole thing. I have been, as an outsider, a fan of the Racket ecosystem. I hope that this ends up making a stronger community. I certainly enjoyed RacketCon this year.
abz10 5y ago
I wonder how much of personality is genetic and largely out of the control of the person. I know mine is. I have two separate anxiety mutations - basically high functioning autism. I often find myself accidentally offending people. I preemptively cancelled myself as a precaution long ago. It seems society has decided that some traits are innate and deserving of understanding and others are not.
- CleverLikeAnOx 5y ago
  How does one preemptively cancel oneself?
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - abz10 5y ago
    I quit my BigTech job and all social media. Something I said was misinterpreted as condescending to a female colleague and I was reprimanded by HR. Within a year she made the same complaint against everyone else in the office but by that time I had already left.
- yenwel 5y ago
  Well autism is sometimes labelled as individuals that are less "self-domesticated". Animals can be domesticated by humans and breeded to be tamer. Tame animals are more sociable towards humans, also have lower intelligenc and brain capacity since alot of their needs are met by the domesticator I guess. See the difference between cats/wild cats, dogs and wolves or foxes and domesticated foxes. Self domestication is the concept that we as humans have domesticated ourselves. At one end of the spectrum you have individuals that are less domesticated and fit in less with society (autistic people or psychopaths: generally lacking some sort of empathy (respectively cognitive and affective because there is a difference). On the other end of the spectrum you have Prader Willi and Angelman which are very tame and sociable but with lower cognitive abilities. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-imprinted-brain/201608/autism-and-domestication-syndrome-in-humans https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-imprinted-brain/...
LaserToy 5y ago
For some reason I don’t relive in the sincerity of those apologies. You have an adult who acted as a*le for a whole life. They were told it multiple times. They saw other people cried. And now they finally apologizing when s*t hit thr fan. Sure. I’m also wondering whether sociopathy has something to do with this. The blog post claims multiple incidents, not a single one.
asimeqi 5y ago
Felleisen is incredibly passionate about programming. He has strong opinions and will tell you about them. I graduated from NEU many years ago. He was not my professor and I doubt he ever knew my name. I happened to listen to a general talk he was once giving when he suddenly launched into a tangent about how much better Scheme's call/cc was than C's setjmp()/longjmp(). I completely agreed but thought that he was beating a dead horse and I might have smirked a little bit. 3 days later he accosted me in a different building and berated me for thinking setjmp()/longjmp() was better! I never got the chance to explain myself but I really think it doesn't matter. There are many people who don't like his style but I personally think it's fine. He is pretty direct and obviously gets results. I wish I would have been able to take his courses and maybe even work with him on his projects.
- Kina 5y ago
  > 3 days later he accosted me in a different building and berated me for thinking setjmp()/longjmp() was better! I never got the chance to explain myself but I really think it doesn't matter. I think this is sorta emblematic of the problem. People respond to the same stimuli differently, for some people, this would completely ruin their day and leave them terrified. I want to believe that folks like Felleisen don't think they're being malicious, but they fail to empathize with others and are sometimes oblivious to the power dynamics. Over time they get used to not being called out for their behavior because people start to facilitate it for a variety of reasons. Felleisen's opinion carries weight far more than some random student. A disparaging word, even in passing, could break someone's career. Certainly people should learn to grow a bit of a thick skin, but there are many people like this comment [1] where Felleisen has crossed a line and is just clearly abusive. I can't imagine having an experience like that, then think about the fact that he might be on the committee reviewing your dissertation. I tip my hat to you that you are able to walk off such things, but not everyone can do so and failure to empathize with that reality is a major problem in society. Nobody should be babied, but nobody should be needlessly berated. > He is pretty direct and obviously gets results. I really dislike this train of thought. I've heard it before and not once have I seen it as a truism. It is excessively simplistic; never mind how the sausage is made, as long as the sausage tastes good? Universities expect professors to generate grants. If you burn out 5-10 grad students a year, but you keep the money flowing in, the university will not really question it, but there are 5-10 promising careers that have been destroyed. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27546538 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27546538
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
circlefavshape 5y ago
From Butterick's blog post > I learned early on that when you tattle on the bullies, they come for you twice as hard the next time. The only workable tactic was to distance yourself and hope they found someone else to pick on. For anyone who is bullied, or has kids who are being bullied - this is a very weak tactic. When I was bullied in school what worked was a) allies and b) violence (I had the good fortune to grow up in a place where schoolkids never carry weapons)
elbrian 5y ago
This apology is written in an entirely self-serving tone. The author is clearly a narcissist.
cannabis_sam 5y ago
Conclusion: stay the hell away from Racket.. It still amazes me how eager people are to defend abusive behavior when it emanates from perceived brilliance.
throwaway210918 5y ago
I was a graduate student in Matthias’s lab from 2000 to 2004. During that time, I spent many, many hours working at my desk in close proximity to his office. I watched many individuals go in and come out of private meetings with Matthias. I TA’d a handful of courses under him. I participated in student meetings with him. I worked in his summer schools for high school teachers. I traveled with him to conferences. I saw him interact with many undergraduate and graduate students in personal, small group, and large group settings. I saw him give many talks and respond to questions at those talks. I saw him sit in the audience at many talks and faculty interviews, ask questions and interject comments at those talks. I interacted personally with Matthias many times. I gave practice talks in front of Matthias. I wrote conference papers that were rejected and were an embarrassment to both myself and Matthias. I admit that I was one of his weakest students. In every case with me, however, Matthias acted professionally, encouraged me, and went out of his way to try to help me succeed. His private and public comments to me and others were, by far, constructive. I’m honored to have had the opportunity to be mentored by him. During that time, I never witnessed Matthias bullying anyone. Never. For clarity, I’m using the definition of Workplace Bullying written by Crystal Raypole: “Workplace bullying is harmful, targeted behavior that happens at work. It might be spiteful, offensive, mocking, or intimidating. It forms a pattern, and it tends to be directed at one person or a few people (https://www.healthline.com/health/workplace-bullying).” https://www.healthline.com/health/workplace-bullying).” No one told me or mentioned in my presence that he had done so. Was he opinionated? Yes. Was he brusque? At times, yes. Did he push his undergraduate and graduate students hard? Yes. Was he critical? Yes. Did he suffer fools lightly? No. Was he outspoken? Yes. Did he ever make any ad hominem attacks? None that I ever witnessed. Did he give people second and third chances? Yes. Did he help those under him improve and excel? Yes. Was I inspired by Matthias? Yes. Could he have done some things differently? Yes, that goes without saying for any of us. Doing so, would he have had such successful results? Who can say. Were individuals hurt by his criticism? Yes, and, while I can’t speak for others, I know that it was due more to my ego being deflated, rightfully, than anything else. I never saw Matthias use his authority to belittle anyone, neither did he engage any petty retribution when provoked. Nothing that I witnessed or heard about, ever rose to the level of bullying. I saw that he was passionate and wanted to improve the quality of his craft, of his students, and of his profession.
muyuu 5y ago
This sounds pretty good to me. This point stood out to me: > I think of everyone in the room as an equal in such settings, and I expect them to see themselves this way. I clearly forget that I am the oldest and most experienced—and I should act this way in a post-mortem conversation. Clearly this is a major blind spot, esp. when considering the "free speech experiment" section of the site... publishing what Damore posted as a mere Jr. SoftEng in Google is radically not the same as doing it as one of the most senior people in the organisation - it's pretty much the opposite of speaking truth to power and of course it can be seen as an act of intimidation, even if you are in the ideological minority.
gukoff 5y ago
I see that many see the apology as innocent and sincere. To me, this apology screams narcissism and abuse. The author cares only about his public image and tailors the article accordingly. He knows what he's doing there. And I really, really don't envy those who work for him. I wish I could think otherwise. But once you deal with a narcissist and see them abuse people, you know it.

Apology

256 points by tiagoleifert 5y ago

Animats 5y ago

This is about something that happened in 2018?

lucasmullens 5y ago
The blog post this is in response to was posted in June 2021.
crackercrews 5y ago
It relates to this discussion on Racket, [1] which was on HN yesterday. 1: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27531508 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27531508
cpach 5y ago
Yes it is. It’s new information to most people though.
lucideer 5y ago
It sounds like the author is trying to make out that it's about something that happened in 2018, but the original post he's responding to was pretty clearly about a lot more.

MaxBarraclough 5y ago

Context: Why I no longer contribute to Racket. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27531508 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27531508

LAC-Tech 5y ago
I really think people need to learn to push back, and talk plainly. This could have easily been a blog called "that time Felleisen was being a cunt and I told him to go fuck himself" and been 1/4 the length.
- piercebot 5y ago
  I'm not sure I would classify that as "talking plainly." Words like that would put anybody on the defensive, and being on the defensive does not make people receptive to positive change.
- qbasic_forever 5y ago
  There are very real cultural differences and taboos against questioning and pushing back against authority. What one culture may view as normal and expected process in improvement, another is horrified and ashamed to consider. Do not assume just because you've grown up or grown accustomed to it that it's 'normal' or practiced everywhere. This is perhaps one of the biggest frictions I see in teams that are full of folks from different cultures and backgrounds.
  - neolog 5y ago
    Where do people stay silent for so long? [Edit: rephrased]
    - williamsmj 5y ago
      Hierarchies. The answer to your question is: hierarchies.
      - neolog 5y ago
        This is a good answer, thanks.
        gautamcgoel 5y ago
        /s
    - qbasic_forever 5y ago
      Did you read the original blog post? They clearly mention at the end they posted it because they were repeatedly asked why they disengaged from the Racket community: "Why mention any of this now? Two reasons. Over the last year, friends in the Racket community have asked me why I’ve reduced my involvement. Absent anything else, they assume the most obvious reason: that I’m bored or frustrated with Racket as a language. That I’ve moved on to other things. Not true. On the contrary, it seems important to reassert: I like almost everything about Racket. It’s still my favorite programming environment. I use it almost every day. I wish I could still contribute the way I did before. But I can’t subject myself to more of the same. In that sense, it feels more like exile than withdrawal. I’ve been involved with FOSS projects for nearly 25 years. A project that depends on free contributions of time & effort—as every FOSS project does—needs to be an appealing place for others to make gifts of their time. Sure, in any community of opinionated humans, occasional frictions and disagreements are natural. But Felleisen’s outrageous hostility went far beyond anything I’d experienced." Also this main issue occurred three years ago. It is very odd to assume that someone decided to just sit on an issue for three years and then suddenly gotcha throw it out of nowhere. This person was bullied out of the Racket community. They quietly left rather than try to fight against aggressive personalities. That's the real story here, and what happens in 99% of similar incidents.
chronogram 5y ago
So both just needed to talk to each other? No idea why they have to go through HN proxies.
- mvid 5y ago
  Matthew made it pretty clear he had talked to a number of people, and waited months before going public
  - bobthechef 5y ago
    But did he speak with Matthias directly first? There is an adult way to escalate problems which is to first speak privately with the person in question to address the problem or correct the misunderstanding. If that fails, you could speak with people in the relevant social circle shared with Matthias. Dragging your problem into the public square is only something you do if those fail AND there are sufficiently good reasons to make it public. Just to be clear: I am not defending or criticizing Matthias one way or another. I am speaking purely about process. This is a process that should be observed equally by those in positions of leadership toward those whom they serve in that role as well as the later toward the former. That is, both Matthias and Matthew.
    - fatbird 5y ago
      This is one way to handle the problem, but certainly not the only way, and not a way that is blessed as "the mature solution". There are a variety of legtimate reasons not try to speak first privately to Matthias. Butterick gets at one of them in his essay, namely that allowing bullies to keep their bullying private has the effect of isolating other victims and preventing more coherent responses to it by a group.
    - JohnHaugeland 5y ago
      Instead of "just asking questions," then using that to make commentary that doesn't make sense because you don't know what's happening, try becoming familiar with the situation
    - 5y ago
threatofrain 5y ago
Discussion on Lobsters. https://lobste.rs/s/6rnyn9/why_i_no_longer_contribute_racket https://lobste.rs/s/6rnyn9/why_i_no_longer_contribute_racket
- LAC-Tech 5y ago
  Thanks for this public service announcement to never go on lobsters. Wow.
- wchar_t 5y ago
  Why did you consider it necessary to link there? I'm genuinely curious.
  - chris_wot 5y ago
    It is also linked on the "Why I no longer contribute to Racket".
IncRnd 5y ago
Thank you. That references the blog at https://beautifulracket.com/appendix/why-i-no-longer-contribute-to-racket.html https://beautifulracket.com/appendix/why-i-no-longer-contrib.... At the beginning: "No facts were disputed. The incidents were numerous, happening over a period of years. They were always witnessed by others on the Racket core team. For that reason, there’s no need to enumerate the details now. Though I will give one example as illustration" If there was no need to enumerate details, why did he write an additional 12 pages in a blog post? This whole incident, whatever it was or is, seems like two personalities with egos that won't stop. That's not something I care about.
nerdponx 5y ago
Wild. Where were the other people in the room? This sounds like shared (ir)responsibility beyond the individual with the bad attitude.
- ljm 5y ago
  This was my take on it. It could be that literally everyone on the leadership team was terrified into conformity, but I find that hard to believe, and that instead it was more of an inner-sanctum that held some admiration for the leader who let them in.
itronitron 5y ago
Seems like an appropriate time to fork the project.

fungiblecog 5y ago

Yeah, yeah. We always get the inevitable apology. Actions not words, please.

plorkyeran 5y ago
This is an actual apology that unambiguously admits he was in the wrong, and that's not at all inevitable. An apology is only the first step, but this is a good example of what that first step should look like.
- yawaramin 5y ago
  It's really not. What a real apology should have looked like: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27545116 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27545116

howolduis 5y ago

apology? nothing of what I read sounds like an apology. You basically said that your friends told you that what you did looked bad, and based on that, you feel sorry that he "felt" hurt. Then go on saying how good and gracious you were to him? c'mon... edit: typo

barnabees 5y ago
If this isn't a real apology then what would you say a real apology looks like? Of the many public apologies I've read in the past this reads like an honest, genuine one. He admitted guilt, explained what he did wrong and did not try to justify it, and clearly stated that he apologizes. What's missing?
- williamsmj 5y ago
  I have no doubt it is honest, but it's not a good apology. He barely remembers the specific incident (by his own admission). That's not his fault, but it makes the apology pretty much meaningless. He seems to assume he was a bit of a grumpy-puss that day, and that "jaded" their subsequent interactions. This is incredibly glib and diminishes the specific incident. But more importantly, he never admits to being a bully. The original post gives this incident as an example of a pattern of abusive behavior. He sidesteps that entirely.
  - whatshisface 5y ago
    What's a bully? Someone who loses their temper? Someone who's scary and makes enemies more easily than friends? I think a bully is someone who uses intimidation to get their way, if someone intimidates random bystanders what they have is a need to work on their emotional self-control.
    - neolog 5y ago
      It's more like someone who habitually uses power in a mean way.

williamsmj 5y ago

tldr: "I barely remember the specific incident you cited merely as an example of an ongoing pattern of absuive behavior, but it sounds like I was a jerk that day. Oops! We good?"

wpietri 5y ago
Well put. And to me that's one of the horrors of abusers. I believe they really don't remember the details of the incidents. For them it's a momentary way to feel good. For the victims, it sticks with them for months, years, decades.

DJBunnies 5y ago

Took a hard cs course with fellisen at NU. Dude is ignorant to his toxic behavior, preaching egoless programming while being needlessly cruel during graded presentations. I know many cs folks at NU refused to take his classes.

encryptluks2 5y ago
Is this #metoo all over again? Must be thousands of victims all over the place just now willing to speak up cause someone published a blog without actually providing any proof.
qez 5y ago
And I know many more who sought out his class.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
nefitty 5y ago
I got curious and checked his rate my professor profile. People either loved his class or hated his behavior. Sometimes both.
fighterpilot 5y ago
I worked for one of these types many labelled an asshole and grew to love it, and he had the most loyal group of people around him you could imagine. There's a super important distinction between the person with extremely high standards that skewers anything mediocre and that can legitimately be won over by doing exceptional work (my old boss), and the narcissist who is critical for the mere purposes of bullying (or the type that mixes both of those together). If the rage and ultra high standards are strictly about work quality and vary only along that dimension, then that's someone I actually really like working with.
- dboreham 5y ago
  You sir were a flying monkey.

mirthflat83 5y ago

tldr: “I can’t remember clearly but think I had a bad day, sorry dude lol”

jtbayly 5y ago

Summary of several HN replies: “Yeah, yeah, whatever. Saying you’re sorry doesn’t cut it. You need to pay for it before we will accept your apology.” Hence, cancel culture. Edit: There’s no need to therefor assume the dude is totally changed based on one apology, but good grief people. The lesson I’m learning here is, “Never apologize. It will do no good and will simply drag the situation out longer.”

spoonjim 5y ago
Well if saying “sorry” provides one with complete absolution then what’s the real cost of acting badly?
- jtbayly 5y ago
  Who said it absolves him? The question is why attack him for apologizing?
  - williamsmj 5y ago
    Because the apology is so shallow and glib and self-serving that it's literally worse than no apology.
    - teddyh 5y ago
      It might be a bad and insufficient apology, but people always say that, about all apologies, even honest and good ones. A more workable policy would be to never criticize apologies, but accept them and move on. You never want to make apologizing a sure-losing move.
      - spoonjim 5y ago
        Yes, but the apology should not affect the likelihood of being punished. If you do something bad, apologizing shouldn't be a ticket out of punishment.
- neolog 5y ago

dog_boy 5y ago

this response absolutely sucks shit

jwcacces 5y ago

The only one who can judge the worthiness of this apology is Matthew Butterick himself. As for me, this sounds like the first steps of the self realization process Matthias should go through in an effort to better himself. Let's not judge it to harshly. Rather let's encourage him to keep on walking down that path of self improvement that we all should be on.

boredtofears 5y ago
> first steps of the self realization process Every time I see a well written apology letter, I cringe at all the self-actualization rhetoric people respond to it with. As if they must do more and become some kind of Buddhist monk before true retribution is to be awarded to them.
- throwaway9980 5y ago
  Yes, I agree that we can all do better, be better, strive for good things for all, etc, but this language borders on religious. And it’s everywhere these days. It’s as if not always living up to a set of ideals is the modern original sin that requires constant atonement.
  - itronitron 5y ago
    Many people have been conditioned to believe that people in positions of power are virtuous, and that they reached that position by doing good things well. It's not that everyone expects people in power to live a set of ideals, it's that they have been marketed as such.
- vanderZwan 5y ago
  The apology is in response to being called out on one example in decades of behavior so toxic that a significant number of people have left academia, an otherwise amazing open source project and who knows what else, as a result of it. This has been confirmed by many people at this point. An apology in that context is a starting point, a request to open a door that has been shut by the abuser themselves. An apology doesn't actually fix anything regarding the toxic behavior, and not getting the benefit of doubt that ths behavior, again, with a track record of decades, is suddenly over is not just completely justified, it would be naive to do otherwise. And to think that this kind of hesitance at trusting someone who has so systemically violated it for. decades. has anything to do with "awarding retribution" or "becoming like a Buddhist monk" is incredibly tone deaf.

ashton314 5y ago

A culture that holds individuals accountable must also be forgiving of human foibles—especially with sincere apologies. It’s refreshing to see two adults acting like it: Matthew limited his criticism to what was relevant, and Matthias responded promptly, politely, and apologetically. Both stances take humility and wisdom.

howolduis 5y ago
he never responded to what mattered to Matthew though. He responded to one specific instance and not the overall problem.

neolog 5y ago

An apology is a good first step and I'm glad he's taken it. There are several remaining steps, including gathering feedback, developing an improvement plan, and implementing it. I hope Felleisen will take these steps too.

shkkmo 5y ago
Precisely this. I did get the feeling that the appology was heartfelt. I also felt the appology failed to recognize the that the complaint was about a sustained set of issues and not a one time incident. The lack of any discussion of what Fellleisen and Racket will try to do going forward was glaringly missing, particularly becuase Felleisen couldn't independently identify the mistakes that he made and required outside observers to understand where the person he bullied was comming from. I feel like a lot of damage would have been minimized if there had been people in that meeting who had made clear how out-of-line the behavior was immediately so that Felleisen could have immediately addressed the issue and hopefully learned from it.

Causality1 5y ago

Does Matthias really believe we're so naive as to think this attempt to cover for a career of toxic and abusive behavior by apologizing for a single incident is going to work? It's the oldest trick in the bully playbook. Technically speaking, apologizing to him is better than not apologizing to him, but it does nothing to make other people more willing to work with you.

aaomidi 5y ago

Starting with an excuse for the behavior is not a good way to do an apology.

CharlesW 5y ago
Except that he does not start with that — he starts with an unequivocal apology. As someone with no skin in the game and who doesn't know these people, it sounds like he's trying to explain why he didn't realize sooner that he was such a raging asshole to Matthew. (I understand that Mattias apparently has a history of this kind of behavior that this apology does not address.)
- wpietri 5y ago
  I read it as justification, which is typical in half-assed apologies. If that were the only flaw, I might call it a reasonable mistake. But given the other issues (failure to look at pattern, failure to work toward preventing similar future issues, failure to make amends), I think that's too generous a reading. To me it looks like part of a pattern.
qez 5y ago
I think you read the blog post in the wrong order. The apology is on line 3.
- shkkmo 5y ago
  The way the appology is set to the right does make it easy to accidentally skip past.

fastasucan 5y ago

Doesn't sit right that he is so focused on the one example of what was supposed to be lot of bad behaviour over time. From the first blogpost/accusation it was clearly a personality problem, however here it is treated as a singular episode.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
chris_wot 5y ago
It appears there are a lot of people who say otherwise.

faitswulff 5y ago

> …I even proposed [Butterick] could replace me. I always thought that your experience and your outside view would seriously improve our work. I still think so. That would be an interesting turn of events.

xwdv 5y ago

Bad move on his part. No public apology ever makes a positive difference. It only draws attention to yourself. People’s thirst for social justice cannot be quenched.

nubb 5y ago

I’m so surprised at the vitriol in these comments. He spoke to others about the situation and apologized. What more can a person do?

wpietri 5y ago
What more can a person do? Just off the top of my head: He could have addressed the full substance of the blog post, which was a pattern of "intentional, personalized abuse and bullying" with "incidents were numerous, happening over a period of years". He could have used this incident to reflect on his broader behavior not just toward this one person but more generally. He could have talked the steps he was taking to make sure he did less harm in the future. He could have asked for forgiveness. He could have offered to make amends to Matthew Butterick, to repair the relationship. He could have recognized that this harmed not just Butterick, but the broader community around the project. He could ask that community for help identifying other times he was abusive. He could apologize for that too and work to make amends there as well. He could have addressed this bit: "Nor did any member of Racket’s core team hold him to account. Everyone just shrugged and moved on. I was encouraged to do the same." In particular, he could recognize that he was part of a social structure that not only accepted abusive behavior but actually enabled it. Once recognizing that, he could work to change the system such that abusive behavior was no longer tolerated. And that's off the top of my head.
- neolog 5y ago
  Good answer. Though "ask for forgiveness" seems like a specific cultural/quasireligious thing that not everybody assigns meaning to.
  - wpietri 5y ago
    In the sense of asking forgiveness from $DEITY, sure. But in the sense of saying to the person harmed, "Please forgive me," I think it's very broad.
    - neolog 5y ago

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

YuriNiyazov 5y ago

@dang could we please unflag this? If the original message stayed up and was not flagged, this should remain too.

gautamcgoel 5y ago
Dumb question: does the @ actually do anything on HN?
- detaro 5y ago
  no
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- yjftsjthsd-h 5y ago
  No, and mods have indicated that email is better IIRC.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- YuriNiyazov 5y ago
  No; it's just that "dang" it's also a word in English, so the "@" is there to disambiguate.

yellow_lead 5y ago

I'm curious why this was flagged. If the discussion yesterday didn't break HN rules, I'm not sure why the response would. I suppose both of them technically fall into "off-topic" discussion though.

DoreenMichele 5y ago
Flags are from users. So to some extent it's random personal opinion and unless you identified all individuals who flagged it and asked them why?, you aren't going to actually know, though it is fairly common for someone to give their opinion about why they think it was likely flagged (and sometimes I appreciate their observations and sometimes I'm kind of like "That's just your opinion, man!").
- tinco 5y ago
  My finger was hovering over the flag button for a while. I was following the discussion and for the first hour or so the comments were of ridiculously low quality. I think of the first 20 comments less than 5 had positive score. I was thinking of flagging it because I just didn't see how any good discussion could form on it. I didn't flag because it seemed like the post itself had relevance.
  - DoreenMichele 5y ago
    Thank you for your comment. It's rare for me to flag something. I usually try to leave a good faith comment if it seems worth discussing and the initial comments are sucky. I'm not saying that's some kind of "right" way to handle it. That's just how I behave -- or try to behave -- and there are myriad factors that influence those choices. I'm just talking here.
dang 5y ago
Possibly some readers are tired of the repetition, and they're not wrong [1] - that's why we downweight follow-up stories [2]. However, we make exceptions when there's significant new information (SNI) [3], which basically amounts to: is there enough of a diff [4] from the previous thread to support a substantially new discussion? In this case I'd say you could call it either way: the fact that Felleisen apologized is significant new information but on the other hand the thread is...of the second freshness. I've turned off the flags for now. [1] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=curiosity%20repetition%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so... [2] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=follow-up%20by%3Adang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor... [3] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=%22significant%20new%20information%22%20by%3Adang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so... [4] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=diffs%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...

gautamcgoel 5y ago

Why is this flagged?? It seems very relevant to the HN community. You can't allow the criticism post to stay up and attract hundreds of comments and then flag the apology post.

secnono 5y ago

The classic "I'm sorry, but" Not a real apology, nor real regret, merely self serving fodder.

ltbarcly3 5y ago

So now we have to issue formal apologies when someone decides to attack us in public for being rude to them years earlier? Are people made of wet tissue paper, unable to move on after someone wasn't nice to them years ago?

ltbarcly3 5y ago
So people are modding down my comment above. I feel attacked, and I insist each person who downvoted my comment formally apologize for this unproductive negative feedback.

throw3456548 5y ago

Huh. It's interesting to see this come out now. Years ago I was planning on entering a PL PhD program until I met Felleisen. He yelled at me, insulted me, and I left nearly crying. That was the last straw that led to me leave academia, and I never came back. A young woman I know switched out of her computer science major after taking his class and said she still had nightmares about him. Another person I know worked with him on a project as a student and said half the team dropped out due to his behavior. He would call the remaining team at 2am or 3am to yell at them sometimes (according to my friend). I'm not sure how I feel about this coming out. I don't get the feeling that he's doing this on purpose. I've heard from people close to him that that's just the way he is and you have to get used to it. At the same time, he's been making people feel like shit for decades. Academia used to be a place for misfits who don't understand social conventions. What if not understanding social conventions comes off to others as bullying, though? Racket could be better off without him. He might be brilliant, but he is so difficult to work with, he hurts his own project.

EGreg 5y ago
I met Richard Stallman’s lawyer several years ago, having made an appointment with him to discuss our open source framework, Qbix. Eben Moglen had a nice office near Lincoln Center in NYC. Somehow on the way to the office, he had taken a look at our site and mistook something on it... by the time I arrived, he spent the entire time yelling at me and berating whatever he could find out about me. A very strange character. Having said that, he did help me find out what I was after: how to make sure large corporations wouldn’t use my open source code while smaller ones could — we should use Affero GPL. So, all in all it was a productive meeting. But still, it was pretty surreal. Apparently he has done it with other people too: https://observer.com/2011/12/in-which-eben-moglen-like-legit-yells-at-me-for-being-on-facebook-2/ https://observer.com/2011/12/in-which-eben-moglen-like-legit... There is more to this. A couple years prior he had encouraged four NYU students to start Diaspora, a similar project to ours...
- NtochkaNzvanova 5y ago
  Sounds like a difficult experience for you, but the other example you cite (https://observer.com/2011/12/in-which-eben-moglen-like-legit-yells-at-me-for-being-on-facebook-2/ https://observer.com/2011/12/in-which-eben-moglen-like-legit...) does not seem to reinforce your point that he's some sort of abusive individual. It belongs on one of those "Journalists Posting Their Ls" accounts on Twitter. The author comes off as an utter dolt, while Moglen's position is well-reasoned. It's hard to comprehend why some people are so allergic to the entire notion of personal responsibility; that changing the world starts with changing your behavior, not just bleating about it online and waiting for some regulator to fix your problems (whose incentives are likely not aligned with yours anyway).

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

mark_l_watson 5y ago

I thought that was a good apology and I hope that it gives Matthew closure and a peaceful heart over this whole thing. I have been, as an outsider, a fan of the Racket ecosystem. I hope that this ends up making a stronger community. I certainly enjoyed RacketCon this year.

abz10 5y ago

I wonder how much of personality is genetic and largely out of the control of the person. I know mine is. I have two separate anxiety mutations - basically high functioning autism. I often find myself accidentally offending people. I preemptively cancelled myself as a precaution long ago. It seems society has decided that some traits are innate and deserving of understanding and others are not.

CleverLikeAnOx 5y ago
How does one preemptively cancel oneself?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- abz10 5y ago
  I quit my BigTech job and all social media. Something I said was misinterpreted as condescending to a female colleague and I was reprimanded by HR. Within a year she made the same complaint against everyone else in the office but by that time I had already left.
yenwel 5y ago
Well autism is sometimes labelled as individuals that are less "self-domesticated". Animals can be domesticated by humans and breeded to be tamer. Tame animals are more sociable towards humans, also have lower intelligenc and brain capacity since alot of their needs are met by the domesticator I guess. See the difference between cats/wild cats, dogs and wolves or foxes and domesticated foxes. Self domestication is the concept that we as humans have domesticated ourselves. At one end of the spectrum you have individuals that are less domesticated and fit in less with society (autistic people or psychopaths: generally lacking some sort of empathy (respectively cognitive and affective because there is a difference). On the other end of the spectrum you have Prader Willi and Angelman which are very tame and sociable but with lower cognitive abilities. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-imprinted-brain/201608/autism-and-domestication-syndrome-in-humans https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-imprinted-brain/...

LaserToy 5y ago

For some reason I don’t relive in the sincerity of those apologies. You have an adult who acted as a*le for a whole life. They were told it multiple times. They saw other people cried. And now they finally apologizing when s*t hit thr fan. Sure. I’m also wondering whether sociopathy has something to do with this. The blog post claims multiple incidents, not a single one.

asimeqi 5y ago

Felleisen is incredibly passionate about programming. He has strong opinions and will tell you about them. I graduated from NEU many years ago. He was not my professor and I doubt he ever knew my name. I happened to listen to a general talk he was once giving when he suddenly launched into a tangent about how much better Scheme's call/cc was than C's setjmp()/longjmp(). I completely agreed but thought that he was beating a dead horse and I might have smirked a little bit. 3 days later he accosted me in a different building and berated me for thinking setjmp()/longjmp() was better! I never got the chance to explain myself but I really think it doesn't matter. There are many people who don't like his style but I personally think it's fine. He is pretty direct and obviously gets results. I wish I would have been able to take his courses and maybe even work with him on his projects.

Kina 5y ago
> 3 days later he accosted me in a different building and berated me for thinking setjmp()/longjmp() was better! I never got the chance to explain myself but I really think it doesn't matter. I think this is sorta emblematic of the problem. People respond to the same stimuli differently, for some people, this would completely ruin their day and leave them terrified. I want to believe that folks like Felleisen don't think they're being malicious, but they fail to empathize with others and are sometimes oblivious to the power dynamics. Over time they get used to not being called out for their behavior because people start to facilitate it for a variety of reasons. Felleisen's opinion carries weight far more than some random student. A disparaging word, even in passing, could break someone's career. Certainly people should learn to grow a bit of a thick skin, but there are many people like this comment [1] where Felleisen has crossed a line and is just clearly abusive. I can't imagine having an experience like that, then think about the fact that he might be on the committee reviewing your dissertation. I tip my hat to you that you are able to walk off such things, but not everyone can do so and failure to empathize with that reality is a major problem in society. Nobody should be babied, but nobody should be needlessly berated. > He is pretty direct and obviously gets results. I really dislike this train of thought. I've heard it before and not once have I seen it as a truism. It is excessively simplistic; never mind how the sausage is made, as long as the sausage tastes good? Universities expect professors to generate grants. If you burn out 5-10 grad students a year, but you keep the money flowing in, the university will not really question it, but there are 5-10 promising careers that have been destroyed. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27546538 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27546538

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

circlefavshape 5y ago

From Butterick's blog post > I learned early on that when you tattle on the bullies, they come for you twice as hard the next time. The only workable tactic was to distance yourself and hope they found someone else to pick on. For anyone who is bullied, or has kids who are being bullied - this is a very weak tactic. When I was bullied in school what worked was a) allies and b) violence (I had the good fortune to grow up in a place where schoolkids never carry weapons)

elbrian 5y ago

This apology is written in an entirely self-serving tone. The author is clearly a narcissist.

cannabis_sam 5y ago

Conclusion: stay the hell away from Racket.. It still amazes me how eager people are to defend abusive behavior when it emanates from perceived brilliance.

throwaway210918 5y ago

I was a graduate student in Matthias’s lab from 2000 to 2004. During that time, I spent many, many hours working at my desk in close proximity to his office. I watched many individuals go in and come out of private meetings with Matthias. I TA’d a handful of courses under him. I participated in student meetings with him. I worked in his summer schools for high school teachers. I traveled with him to conferences. I saw him interact with many undergraduate and graduate students in personal, small group, and large group settings. I saw him give many talks and respond to questions at those talks. I saw him sit in the audience at many talks and faculty interviews, ask questions and interject comments at those talks. I interacted personally with Matthias many times. I gave practice talks in front of Matthias. I wrote conference papers that were rejected and were an embarrassment to both myself and Matthias. I admit that I was one of his weakest students. In every case with me, however, Matthias acted professionally, encouraged me, and went out of his way to try to help me succeed. His private and public comments to me and others were, by far, constructive. I’m honored to have had the opportunity to be mentored by him. During that time, I never witnessed Matthias bullying anyone. Never. For clarity, I’m using the definition of Workplace Bullying written by Crystal Raypole: “Workplace bullying is harmful, targeted behavior that happens at work. It might be spiteful, offensive, mocking, or intimidating. It forms a pattern, and it tends to be directed at one person or a few people (https://www.healthline.com/health/workplace-bullying).” https://www.healthline.com/health/workplace-bullying).” No one told me or mentioned in my presence that he had done so. Was he opinionated? Yes. Was he brusque? At times, yes. Did he push his undergraduate and graduate students hard? Yes. Was he critical? Yes. Did he suffer fools lightly? No. Was he outspoken? Yes. Did he ever make any ad hominem attacks? None that I ever witnessed. Did he give people second and third chances? Yes. Did he help those under him improve and excel? Yes. Was I inspired by Matthias? Yes. Could he have done some things differently? Yes, that goes without saying for any of us. Doing so, would he have had such successful results? Who can say. Were individuals hurt by his criticism? Yes, and, while I can’t speak for others, I know that it was due more to my ego being deflated, rightfully, than anything else. I never saw Matthias use his authority to belittle anyone, neither did he engage any petty retribution when provoked. Nothing that I witnessed or heard about, ever rose to the level of bullying. I saw that he was passionate and wanted to improve the quality of his craft, of his students, and of his profession.

muyuu 5y ago

This sounds pretty good to me. This point stood out to me: > I think of everyone in the room as an equal in such settings, and I expect them to see themselves this way. I clearly forget that I am the oldest and most experienced—and I should act this way in a post-mortem conversation. Clearly this is a major blind spot, esp. when considering the "free speech experiment" section of the site... publishing what Damore posted as a mere Jr. SoftEng in Google is radically not the same as doing it as one of the most senior people in the organisation - it's pretty much the opposite of speaking truth to power and of course it can be seen as an act of intimidation, even if you are in the ideological minority.

gukoff 5y ago

I see that many see the apology as innocent and sincere. To me, this apology screams narcissism and abuse. The author cares only about his public image and tailors the article accordingly. He knows what he's doing there. And I really, really don't envy those who work for him. I wish I could think otherwise. But once you deal with a narcissist and see them abuse people, you know it.