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This is a really thoughtful comment, especially considering your personal experience. There's a hard problem here: what should be done with people who interact

• chevill 5y ago
  >Training them to play nice may not be possible. I'm autistic. It is possible for the socially inept to learn to be less of an asshole and to have better interactions with other people. I did it and we should expect everyone to make an effort to be kinder.
  • jolux 5y ago
    I’m autistic too, and I think what happens is that autistic people who also happen to be brilliant are not expected to learn how to interact well with others to the same extent that autistic folk of average intelligence are, so it ends up being on them whether they care enough about being kind and gentle to others to learn how to interact congenially. I know a lot of autistic people and most of them are nice but some of the more clever ones are indeed rude and socially inept. They also invariably believe that their rudeness is an inescapable aspect of their brilliance, but knowing a lot of brilliant people, autistic and not, this is just untrue.
    • 123123as1asd12 5y ago
      The other side of this is that some of us do end up trying to fit in, hiding it but not well enough... Just come off as assholes or socially inept and hurting peoples feelings a lot more than if you were obviously on the spectrum,
      • skissane 5y ago
        On the one hand, people should try to fit in with society. On the other hand, society should try to be more tolerant and understanding of people who find doing so significantly more challenging than the average person does. I worry that this conversation seems to be focusing on the first point and not paying as much attention to the second.
        • jolux 5y ago
          There's a difference between finding it challenging to fit in and being a bully though, and let's try not to collapse that.
          • skissane 5y ago
            What is "bullying"? Here's one definition [0]: "Bullying is an ongoing and deliberate misuse of power in relationships through repeated verbal, physical and/or social behaviour that intends to cause physical, social and/or psychological harm." Was Felleisen's behaviour a "deliberate misuse of power... that intends to cause physical, social and/or psychological harm"? I don't know this guy personally and all I've read is some stories about him on these blog posts, but I'm not sure if he was deliberately intending to hurt other people, or merely doing so inadvertently out of social incompetence, deficits in cognitive empathy, emotional dysregulation, theory of mind deficits, difficulties in perspective-taking, etc? Individuals with neurodevelopmental and other psychiatric disorders can sometimes exhibit all of those inadvertent sources of interpersonal harm. (I'm not saying Felleisen has any such disorder – maybe he does, maybe he doesn't, I have no idea, so I must assume he might.) [0] https://www.ncab.org.au/bullying-advice/bullying-for-parents/definition-of-bullying/ https://www.ncab.org.au/bullying-advice/bullying-for-parents...
            • jolux 5y ago
              I don’t mean to be crude but it’s kind of irrelevant what the specific definition of bullying is, and it’s definitely irrelevant what his intentions were. Many people find his behavior extremely unpleasant, belligerent, mean, etc, as evidenced by the thread on Butterick’s original post, and the OP in this thread, describing being yelled at and insulted. Having a disorder may be a partial explanation for why someone behaves a certain way. It’s not an excuse for behaving in a way that other people find antisocial, and it certainly doesn’t bind others to tolerate that behavior. Ultimately even if you actually could not act any differently because of a disorder, others would still not be required to tolerate you. This is a consequence of being social animals, we set expectations for behavior and we enforce them. If you can’t play the game, you can’t exactly expect people who can to stop playing for your sake.
  • deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
• fatbird 5y ago
  It's not actually a hard problem. We're not short of brilliant people who are also nice or at least not generally toxic. We don't need to exile the brilliant monsters; we just need to not make allowances for them. If they can learn to meet norms of civility, we can welcome them; if not, we can ignore them. How many brilliant people have we lost access to because they were driven out of the field by someone like Felleisen? All we have to do is not tolerate their bad behaviour. Everyone who met Felleisen and walked away is to be celebrated for not coddling his terrible behaviour; everyone who makes excuses for him should be shamed for enabling him.
  • lmm 5y ago
    > We're not short of brilliant people who are also nice or at least not generally toxic. We absolutely are, especially with the all-encompassing definitions of toxicity that are popular lately.
    • fatbird 5y ago
      Is there a shortage of people with CompSci PhDs to staff universities and do research? Is there a shortage of people to present at conferences? Just because you feel like cancel culture is cancelling people who don't deserve it, doesn't mean we need those people to fill open positions. Every time we make excuses for people like Matthias, we're filling a chair that could have someone else who's not toxic in it. Not to mention: if we have a shortage of brilliant people, why aren't you asking how many brilliant people are driven out of the community by people like Matthias? What's the opportunity cost in brilliant people that Matthias represents? If 2 or 3 people who could make comparable contributions to the community leave because of him, we're already in a net-negative situation wrt smart people advancing the field and community. Even if Matthias is twice as smart as the next best, it only takes a few more for him to be a net negative.
      • lmm 5y ago
        > Is there a shortage of people with CompSci PhDs to staff universities and do research? Is there a shortage of people to present at conferences? There's a shortage of people doing top-quality work that advances the state of the art. > Just because you feel like cancel culture is cancelling people who don't deserve it, doesn't mean we need those people to fill open positions. Every time we make excuses for people like Matthias, we're filling a chair that could have someone else who's not toxic in it. > Not to mention: if we have a shortage of brilliant people, why aren't you asking how many brilliant people are driven out of the community by people like Matthias? What's the opportunity cost in brilliant people that Matthias represents? I absolutely do ask that. But the disproportionate number of brilliant people we see being cancelled lately makes me think that "toxicity" is practically a requirement for brilliance.
• underwater 5y ago
  Someone doesn't immediately become a brilliant asshole. Both skillsets take time to evolve and solidify. If we stop making excuses for people – "that's just they way they are, you know coders, they just don't have social skills, he's an asshole but the company would be in trouble without him" – then may be these people would get the feedback that they need before it becomes a problem of this magnitude.
  • thinknboutstuff 5y ago
    Seriously, if you're that brilliant you can develop some basic social skills. And from what I'm getting from this thread, we are talking fundamental thinking before you engage in a social interaction skills. It's ok not to be great at everything, but it's not acceptable to be toxic on the basis of your other skills. At the very least, sometimes that means the genius team member needs to just shut up and choose their battles. And the first step for many of these type of asshole genius types can be to talk less. Once they master choosing their battles, they can work on how they approach the battles they choose to take.
    • blagie 5y ago
      Intelligence isn't unidimensional. Neither is culture, for that matter, and social skills, what's toxic, and when to shut up is culturally-situated.
      • bredren 5y ago
        It’s generational as well. Particularly the “strong man” style of leadership. You could see it in the Biden / Putin summit.
    • KronisLV 5y ago
      > Seriously, if you're that brilliant you can develop some basic social skills. I'm not entirely sure that this is always possible, since some of those people could possibly be on the autism spectrum, have Asperger's or perhaps other pathologies, that would impede their emotional intelligence. Obviously that's not always the case, but the assumption that it's always possible doesn't seem to be true. > It's ok not to be great at everything, but it's not acceptable to be toxic on the basis of your other skills. With this, however, i fully agree. I do find myself wishing that there was some socially acceptable way to call people out when their behaviour is not appropriate, without antagonizing them. For example, it would have probably been better to inform RMS in that way, rather than resorting to mob justice and "cancelling" him.
• smsm42 5y ago
  I think there are ways between "ignoring it completely" and "unperson anybody who isn't perfectly polite", and there are ways to provide feedback to people about them interacting in a bad manner without exiling them. I think most people would be amenable to such training - just as they learn other social norms. If the professor's management would be willing to employ such training - without choosing between "ignore it" and "lose the professor" - I think many douchebags would learn to keep their douchebaggery in check. Of course, it may require some effort from the management side...
• WalterBright 5y ago
  > what should be done with people who interact poorly with others but are talented and driven? Just do not take their behavior personally. So what if he insults you. It takes two to make an offense - one to give offense, the other to take offense. Don't take offense, and there is no offense. > makes students cry There's no crying in baseball. If you live to be my age, you'll experience the death of people you love. Save the crying for that.
  • aidenn0 5y ago
    There is an incompatibility here between the set of people who act like Felleisen and the set of people who react like Butterick. There is inevitably a message from the community to one side of "change or leave." Whether explicit from action or implicit from inaction. There is both a pragmatic and a moral side to the decission. From the pragmatic point of view, a brilliant asshole might be worth more than the sum of all those offended, or not. From the moral side of things, we can choose to set limits to behaviors even when the benefit of their contributions is net positive considering those who avoid the community. Your argument seems to speak to the moral side of things; that Felleisen's behavior is not so odious as to cross the moral event horizon. What about the simple fact that there are people who will take offense at his behavior, and the community will therefore lose their contributions?
    • tluyben2 5y ago
      I used to think very much like WalterBright as I never took offense (was raised to just listen to what people try to say, not how they say it) (and if someone goes physical (some people, when they cannot hurt you with words, start shoving you etc) I punch them in the face). But that way, usually, the bully just moves to someone else and, even though I am untouched, the person did not change. So now that I am older, I think both sides need to work on this issue: the abuser needs therapy and the victim needs to grow a backbone and thicker skin. It is very sad, but people who start crying from verbal abuse will always be victims: in school and in companies. Bullies sniff them out intuitively. If only to have a better life, I would recommend getting less sensitive through whatever means possible. But out the bully too: they need help or get fired imho.
• _pmf_ 5y ago
  I think the honest, uncomfortable way of dealing with the Stallman and Felleisen fallout would be to ask "what can be done to offer non neurotypical persons an alternative career path that does not involve creating a living hell for other people by becoming managers" (saying this as someone who probably is in this category as well). As long as there is no non managerial career (which is the case in all of academia), people will have to fake being a manager.
  • denton-scratch 5y ago
    I don't buy the story that people who piss-off other people are "non-neurotypical" or "on the spectrum". I piss people off quite often, and quite inadvertently. When it happens, I feel remorse. Friendships have failed terminally because of this. But in general, people like me - they enjoy my conversation and my sense of humour. The thing is, I'm rather blunt - I say what I mean. I don't like to lie, because once you start, things can get pretty tangled ("Oh what a tangled web we weave, When first we practice to deceive"). This bluntness isn't because I'm on some spectrum or other; it's a consequence of experiences I've had through my life, philosophical views that I've integrated into my personality, and a whole slew of unconscious biases and preferences. (When I say "unconscious" I don't mean "subconscious" or "repressed"; I'm aware of my biases and preferences, on the whole, I just mean that they come to operate automatically). I've known and worked with aspies. I know that Asperger's is a real thing. I don't think I've ever known anyone who was autistic. But I think there is a trend for anyone who is a bit abrasive to get labelled "spectrum" (or to label themselves). This is particularly a thing in IT. It is not a sign that you are "on the spectrum" if you get people's backs up. A habit of speaking directly doesn't put you "on the spectrum". A dislike of small-talk doesn't put you "on the spectrum". Not caring much whether others think you're a wonderful person doesn't put you "on the spectrum". IT people tend to steer away from small-talk, and have a preference for nuts and bolts. Their job is dealing with machinery, and machinery doesn't usually work better just because you stroked its ego, or gave it a compliment (I find that swearing at machines is much more helpful!) That's simply their training; it doesn't make them "non-neurotypical", or psychologically unwell. they're in IT because they enjoy working with machines, which isn't weird or sick.
• undecisive 5y ago
  I desperately want to agree with this, but something sticks at the back of my mind: This is not acceptable behaviour. The way we define acceptable behaviour changes from circumstance to circumstance. What's acceptable for Steve Jobs isn't acceptable for the guy at the window of McDonald's (either side of that window). That's maybe just the way it is - but it probably isn't right. But what if everyone around this guy got together and said: There is a minimum behaviour you must conform to. We won't accept you shouting at us, we won't accept you belittling us. If you do it again, we will say "You need to calm down or leave the room please". When you're told that, those will be your only two choices, or everyone else will leave the room. And we may not come back. Because this is not acceptable behaviour. It no longer becomes a question of training. It becomes a question of priority, of data. He can see that he is hit with this phrase day in day out, and he can understand that his behaviour is toxic. Eventually either people will stop saying it because it isn't working, or they'll stop saying it because he is getting the constant negative reinforcement. If it's the former, at least someone has tried. My worry is that with too many people, the individuals are too scared (or scarred) to try. I also worry about the concept of "a path around him". If part of your job description is the instruction of students, you need to learn to deal correctly with those students. If good behaviour is not part of your skillset, then you do not have the skillset for the job, and that should have repercussions. I guess there's an issue with the concept of tenure. But I don't feel like saying "You have the option of entering into this abusive relationship" is the right solution (even if it was that bluntly worded from the outset, which it absolutely should be). And I certainly don't think you should be told "You've tried the abusive narcissist, now that you've suffered you're welcome to escape" If he truly cannot change, then that is sad for him. It should not be the source of damage for yet more people around him though. And looking at the apology, he clearly hasn't understood the effect he has on the people around him.
  • nojokes 5y ago
    It is also not acceptable for Steve Jobs but they can get away with it.