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I don't think I can blame a politician for being technically illiterate, especially one that old. But what the heck is up with the state bureaucrats who report

by _0ffh 5y ago

I don't think I can blame a politician for being technically illiterate, especially one that old. But what the heck is up with the state bureaucrats who report to that guy? I mean someone it the freaking state bureaucratic hierarchy should at least be lucid enough to consult someone who has an actual clue about things as these.

handrous 5y ago
It is my understanding that Parson is not the kind of fellow to give a shit what a state bureaucrat tells him, if it's not what he wants to hear, assuming he'd listen to them in the first place.
prepend 5y ago
I’m guessing it went like this… Politician: Socials are on the web site, who fucked up? IT: the web page is encrypted, we didn’t fuck up, the hacker decrypted the source Politician: sounds good to me, no fuckup on our part, let’s call the cops and prosecutors
- lotsofpulp 5y ago
  Politician [intentionally looking to pass the buck to entities outside their purview and choosing not to research further]: sounds good to me, no fuckup on our part, let’s call the cops and prosecutors
laserlight 5y ago
Why should age excuse incompetence? If they are incompetent in tech, they should at least know that and shut up.
duxup 5y ago
Yeah this should be a "get a the computers guy in here" moment. Then someone explains and everyone moves on.
cle 5y ago
> I don't think I can blame a politician for being technically illiterate, especially one that old. Given the impact of technology on society, we absolutely can and should blame politicians who are technically illiterate.
- birdman3131 5y ago
  I don't blame a politician for being not tech savvy. I can and will blame them for not getting (And listening to!) a tech savvy advisor.
  - barbazoo 5y ago
    And maybe blame the highly partisan electorate too?
  - mindcrime 5y ago
    I would think it depends on how "tech savvy" we're talking about. It's one thing to ask them to write a UNIX shell in C++, or construct a neural network model... I don't see any reason to demand that level of technical sophistication from a governor. But surely there has to be some baseline level of technological literacy that should be expected, no? Something beyond "push this button and the computer turns on" and "Yes, I checked and it's plugged into the wall"??
fencepost 5y ago
I don't think I can blame a politician for being technically illiterate, especially one that old. That right there (probably without the age bit) would be the ideal one liner response from the reporter or an attorney from the paper.
mabub24 5y ago
I think you're under-estimating how much this is just the governor cravenly trying to save face. He's a just a spineless politician who is afraid that this "hack" will be used against him. Because the public was notified of the obvious fuck-up in the html, he felt he needed to "respond to their concerns" and is doing so in the only way he understands, or that that group of the public "under attack" understands as well: criminal charges. He's using the public's fear to try to gain political points by looking "hard on crime". Obviously, he's stupid. But part of the problem is the public also think this was a "hack". Basic understanding of the web is not apparent amongst an enormous swathe of the public.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
lotsofpulp 5y ago
> I mean someone it the freaking state bureaucratic hierarchy should at least be lucid enough to consult someone who has an actual clue about things as these. Why are you letting the leader off the hook and charging the underlings for being responsible for something a leader should be responsible for? Age of the leader is irrelevant because the leader chose to become a leader.
Clubber 5y ago
You have no idea what lengths some state employees will go through to cover their ass and not get fired. It's especially dangerous when cops and prosecutors do it.
- throwaway0a5e 5y ago
  Exactly. When you've endured 15yr of this kind of bullshit and enduring five more gets you an extra 10% on your pension you shut the f up and do what's good for you, organization and taxpayers be damned. Now imagine what this situation teaches all the younger bureaucrats who think they can work hard and make things better.
javajosh 5y ago
I can't stress how differently power works in the Southern States (EDIT: Missouri is a midwestern state officially, but I've always considered it part of the South). It's a very traditional place, where you do not dare contradict, let alone correct, your boss. There is none of this "avoid surrounding yourself with sycophants because they will only tell you what you want to hear" business. There is no upside to speaking up in meetings if what you're saying is not in direct support of the boss. If you do this, you will be branded a trouble-maker, lose favor with the hierarchy, and eventually you will be expelled. Politeness and deference matters far more than any other quality. Loyalty beats integrity every time in the south. This incident is just one example of this in action.
- throwaway0a5e 5y ago
  The south sounds exactly like my experience in two fairly non-political (as non-political as government can be) departments of state government that provide non-controversial social services in a state in the northeast.
- vram22 5y ago
  Why?
- jeremyjh 5y ago
  Missouri is not even remotely considered to be in "the south". At least not by those who live there or in neighboring states.
  - dragonwriter 5y ago
    > Missouri is not even remotely considered to be in "the south". No, but it is both South-adjacent and is considered to be largely within the Bible Belt, which is almost exactly coextensive with the South, except that it excludes parts of Southern Florida and includes all or part of several South-adjacent states, so it's not an entirely hard fo understand mistake.
  - javajosh 5y ago
    You're right! It's part of the midwest officially. Apparently it does share at least some of the classic characteristics of the southern states.
ladyattis 5y ago
This is why you have tech literate experts to correct you and help you make a decision. Just like how you go to your doctor for help with an illness and get advice for what to do next. This isn't hard to do, it's just not politically powerful messaging. Parson wants to look big and powerful and so he'll just blow smoke up his AG's butt to do something which will quietly be dismissed afterwards with almost zero political cost to him.
mindcrime 5y ago
I don't think I can blame a politician for being technically illiterate, especially one that old. I don't think age should excuse this guy at all, nor do I buy into the meme that age has much of anything to do with technical literacy. Consider that Brian Kernighan is ~78, Tim Berners-Lee is 66 (the same age as Governor Parsons here), James Gosling is also 66, Rob Pike is 65, Steve Wozniak is 71, Geoffrey Hinton is 73, and so on. And that's not even considering folks who were around so early they've already passed away, like Marvin Minsky, Dennis Ritchie, John McCarthy, etc.
- _0ffh 5y ago
  Nobody tries to deny that old people can be top notch computer scientists. It's just a fact that computer technology has only arrived in the daily life of the greater population a few decades ago and therefore older people are statistically less likely to be familiar and comfortable with it the way younger people are. I'm surprised I have to write this.
  - mindcrime 5y ago
    It's just a fact that computer technology has only arrived in the daily life of the greater population a few decades ago I would question that assertion, depending on how exactly we choose to define "few". Computers have been a fairly ubiquitous part of our society (in developed nations anyway) for a good 40 years or more now. And they've been absolutely ubiquitous for probably a good 30 years... ubiquitous enough that it's hard to see how any person who considers themselves an educated, competent adult wouldn't have had the opportunity to develop some baseline of technical literacy. Personally I believe that anybody who is a functioning adult in our society today, who doesn't have that technical literacy, lacks it due to their choices not due to their age.
    - _0ffh 5y ago
      Sure. In 1984, 37 years ago, a whopping 8.2% of US households sported a computer. So yeah, ubiquitous indeed. Younger people tend to be more open to new things and less set in their ways, which certainly makes a difference in this case. Note that I'm again not talking in absolutes, but about matters of tendency. Naturally, in the individual case all things come down to opportunity and choice, but it seems curious to deny the statistics of the matter.
RHSeeger 5y ago
> I don't think I can blame a politician for being technically illiterate, especially one that old. I certainly can. They have plenty of money to hire staff, and that should include people to make sure they understand the technology that is integral to the every day lives of their constituents, or at least to push back when they do/say something completely counter to how the world works.
dragonwriter 5y ago
Gov. Parsons’ technical ignorance, such as it may be, is not the source of this. This is a power-oriented political narrative. To the extent it invokes inaccurate explicit or implicit characterizations, that is not because Parsons doesn't understand the truth (he may or may not, that's just irrelevant), but because the descriptions and implications serve the desired narrative.

by _0ffh 5y ago

handrous 5y ago

It is my understanding that Parson is not the kind of fellow to give a shit what a state bureaucrat tells him, if it's not what he wants to hear, assuming he'd listen to them in the first place.

prepend 5y ago

I’m guessing it went like this… Politician: Socials are on the web site, who fucked up? IT: the web page is encrypted, we didn’t fuck up, the hacker decrypted the source Politician: sounds good to me, no fuckup on our part, let’s call the cops and prosecutors

lotsofpulp 5y ago
Politician [intentionally looking to pass the buck to entities outside their purview and choosing not to research further]: sounds good to me, no fuckup on our part, let’s call the cops and prosecutors

laserlight 5y ago

Why should age excuse incompetence? If they are incompetent in tech, they should at least know that and shut up.

duxup 5y ago

Yeah this should be a "get a the computers guy in here" moment. Then someone explains and everyone moves on.

cle 5y ago

> I don't think I can blame a politician for being technically illiterate, especially one that old. Given the impact of technology on society, we absolutely can and should blame politicians who are technically illiterate.

birdman3131 5y ago
I don't blame a politician for being not tech savvy. I can and will blame them for not getting (And listening to!) a tech savvy advisor.
- barbazoo 5y ago
  And maybe blame the highly partisan electorate too?
- mindcrime 5y ago
  I would think it depends on how "tech savvy" we're talking about. It's one thing to ask them to write a UNIX shell in C++, or construct a neural network model... I don't see any reason to demand that level of technical sophistication from a governor. But surely there has to be some baseline level of technological literacy that should be expected, no? Something beyond "push this button and the computer turns on" and "Yes, I checked and it's plugged into the wall"??

fencepost 5y ago

I don't think I can blame a politician for being technically illiterate, especially one that old. That right there (probably without the age bit) would be the ideal one liner response from the reporter or an attorney from the paper.

mabub24 5y ago

I think you're under-estimating how much this is just the governor cravenly trying to save face. He's a just a spineless politician who is afraid that this "hack" will be used against him. Because the public was notified of the obvious fuck-up in the html, he felt he needed to "respond to their concerns" and is doing so in the only way he understands, or that that group of the public "under attack" understands as well: criminal charges. He's using the public's fear to try to gain political points by looking "hard on crime". Obviously, he's stupid. But part of the problem is the public also think this was a "hack". Basic understanding of the web is not apparent amongst an enormous swathe of the public.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

lotsofpulp 5y ago

> I mean someone it the freaking state bureaucratic hierarchy should at least be lucid enough to consult someone who has an actual clue about things as these. Why are you letting the leader off the hook and charging the underlings for being responsible for something a leader should be responsible for? Age of the leader is irrelevant because the leader chose to become a leader.

Clubber 5y ago

You have no idea what lengths some state employees will go through to cover their ass and not get fired. It's especially dangerous when cops and prosecutors do it.

throwaway0a5e 5y ago
Exactly. When you've endured 15yr of this kind of bullshit and enduring five more gets you an extra 10% on your pension you shut the f up and do what's good for you, organization and taxpayers be damned. Now imagine what this situation teaches all the younger bureaucrats who think they can work hard and make things better.

javajosh 5y ago

I can't stress how differently power works in the Southern States (EDIT: Missouri is a midwestern state officially, but I've always considered it part of the South). It's a very traditional place, where you do not dare contradict, let alone correct, your boss. There is none of this "avoid surrounding yourself with sycophants because they will only tell you what you want to hear" business. There is no upside to speaking up in meetings if what you're saying is not in direct support of the boss. If you do this, you will be branded a trouble-maker, lose favor with the hierarchy, and eventually you will be expelled. Politeness and deference matters far more than any other quality. Loyalty beats integrity every time in the south. This incident is just one example of this in action.

throwaway0a5e 5y ago
The south sounds exactly like my experience in two fairly non-political (as non-political as government can be) departments of state government that provide non-controversial social services in a state in the northeast.
vram22 5y ago
Why?
jeremyjh 5y ago
Missouri is not even remotely considered to be in "the south". At least not by those who live there or in neighboring states.
- dragonwriter 5y ago
  > Missouri is not even remotely considered to be in "the south". No, but it is both South-adjacent and is considered to be largely within the Bible Belt, which is almost exactly coextensive with the South, except that it excludes parts of Southern Florida and includes all or part of several South-adjacent states, so it's not an entirely hard fo understand mistake.
- javajosh 5y ago
  You're right! It's part of the midwest officially. Apparently it does share at least some of the classic characteristics of the southern states.

ladyattis 5y ago

This is why you have tech literate experts to correct you and help you make a decision. Just like how you go to your doctor for help with an illness and get advice for what to do next. This isn't hard to do, it's just not politically powerful messaging. Parson wants to look big and powerful and so he'll just blow smoke up his AG's butt to do something which will quietly be dismissed afterwards with almost zero political cost to him.

mindcrime 5y ago

I don't think I can blame a politician for being technically illiterate, especially one that old. I don't think age should excuse this guy at all, nor do I buy into the meme that age has much of anything to do with technical literacy. Consider that Brian Kernighan is ~78, Tim Berners-Lee is 66 (the same age as Governor Parsons here), James Gosling is also 66, Rob Pike is 65, Steve Wozniak is 71, Geoffrey Hinton is 73, and so on. And that's not even considering folks who were around so early they've already passed away, like Marvin Minsky, Dennis Ritchie, John McCarthy, etc.

_0ffh 5y ago
Nobody tries to deny that old people can be top notch computer scientists. It's just a fact that computer technology has only arrived in the daily life of the greater population a few decades ago and therefore older people are statistically less likely to be familiar and comfortable with it the way younger people are. I'm surprised I have to write this.
- mindcrime 5y ago
  It's just a fact that computer technology has only arrived in the daily life of the greater population a few decades ago I would question that assertion, depending on how exactly we choose to define "few". Computers have been a fairly ubiquitous part of our society (in developed nations anyway) for a good 40 years or more now. And they've been absolutely ubiquitous for probably a good 30 years... ubiquitous enough that it's hard to see how any person who considers themselves an educated, competent adult wouldn't have had the opportunity to develop some baseline of technical literacy. Personally I believe that anybody who is a functioning adult in our society today, who doesn't have that technical literacy, lacks it due to their choices not due to their age.
  - _0ffh 5y ago
    Sure. In 1984, 37 years ago, a whopping 8.2% of US households sported a computer. So yeah, ubiquitous indeed. Younger people tend to be more open to new things and less set in their ways, which certainly makes a difference in this case. Note that I'm again not talking in absolutes, but about matters of tendency. Naturally, in the individual case all things come down to opportunity and choice, but it seems curious to deny the statistics of the matter.

RHSeeger 5y ago

> I don't think I can blame a politician for being technically illiterate, especially one that old. I certainly can. They have plenty of money to hire staff, and that should include people to make sure they understand the technology that is integral to the every day lives of their constituents, or at least to push back when they do/say something completely counter to how the world works.

dragonwriter 5y ago

Gov. Parsons’ technical ignorance, such as it may be, is not the source of this. This is a power-oriented political narrative. To the extent it invokes inaccurate explicit or implicit characterizations, that is not because Parsons doesn't understand the truth (he may or may not, that's just irrelevant), but because the descriptions and implications serve the desired narrative.