5 ms·

"If the tag on Valencia had read "F- immigrants," or that piñata was made to represent a transvestite" Yeah, because entrepreneurs and technology businesses ar

"If the tag on Valencia had read "F- immigrants," or that piñata was made to represent a transvestite" Yeah, because entrepreneurs and technology businesses are marginalised by society just like immigrants and trans people are.

supercanuck 13y ago
that was the exact sentence that caused me to leave and check HN comments. If only someone would think of the poor techies! geesh.
walshemj 13y ago
Well in the UK engineers are seen as second class people compare the number of MP's who have a technical background and the average pay in the other professions to engineering. And outside of SV the same is true to an extent in the USA certainly in DC and the corridors of power people with technical backgrounds are rare. And MP like John Robertson (Glasgow North West) who was a LCM for British Telecom before he entered Parliament is very rare. Any congresmen or senators start as a line man for the phone company?
- tommorris 13y ago
  I'm in the UK. If I'm a second-class citizen qua my being a software engineer, I'd say being a second-class citizen pays pretty fucking well. Let's see: good pay, mostly recession-proof work, often interesting work. Crikey, it's like apartheid South Africa or the Deep South during Jim Crow being in engineering...
  - walshemj 13y ago
    Realy when your next in London go to Holbourn and walk into one of the Inns of court and see what the offices of the £2000/ hour barristers look like. Compare a medical Dr with say 15 years experience to an engineer no contest. Or work in the city and have your end customer in fiance say oh I have a pair of shoes that cost more than your entire wardrobe. Just because your paid well compared to a shop assistant doesn't mean the technical people are not second class citizens.
    - tommorris 13y ago
      Here's the difference: the process of becoming a barrister is a long and expensive process that many people fail to complete. Degree, followed by a training course, then you have to try and find a chambers that will accept you, then spend six months to a year doing a pupillage that might cost you more than you make. For at least a year or two, you'd probably make more money as a waiter or shop assistant. And the number of people who try to become a lawyer and fail is pretty high. As for doctors? Have you seen how long medical school takes? It's a long, expensive and arduous journey. In comparison, I make excellent money doing something I mostly enjoy, have no formal qualifications in anything relevant (I've got an MA in Philosophy), never struggle to find work, make enough that I can go out and have fun and so on. Yes, I'm not making £2,000 an hour. I don't particularly care. Does that make a second-class citizen? Absolutely not. (Of course, the fact that I can't legally marry another man actually does make me legally a second-class citizen...) My problem is that any reasonable person outside the tech community would look at the situation we find ourselves in work-wise and think "well, if you enjoy building software, that's a pretty fucking sweet deal". And they're right. Bitching about getting paid a pretty good salary for doing something reasonably enjoyable, having a wide variety of options for work across a variety of sectors... that's pretty fucking whiny and entitled. In this discussion, we started with the comparison by the author of the linked piece of animus towards gentrifying technology workers to the persecution that immigrant and trans people face. The point is this: we do actually get paid quite significantly better than most of society, to do something most of us love. The idea that we're either second class citizens or being persecuted qua being engineers/developers (etc.) is laughable and shows a complete lack of perspective relative to the worst off in society. The idea that animus towards tech workers is in some way analagous to the violence, social disapproval, contempt and often legally-sanctioned persecution that immigrants or trans people face is ridiculous. Should tech workers be paid more? Probably. I certainly wouldn't object if I could double my day rate. Am I a second-class citizen? Absolutely not. I'm getting paid what the market pays for people with my skills and experience. Second class CITIZEN would imply some kind of discrimination or persecution by the state. (Again, like not being able to get married.) Being paid hundreds of pounds a day to write code isn't one of those things.
      - 13y ago
walshemj 13y ago
Well given the proportion of Indian's in the techie community relative to the SF population in general - It is arguably Indirect Racism.
- oblique63 13y ago
  I've lived in SF my entire life, and I can guarantee you that a vast majority of the tech community here is not Indian. SV is a different story, but in SF it is mostly a 'middle-class' white demographic. If there's any "indirect racism" that's going on, it's probably best encapsulated by what's happened to the mission, but even that would be stretching it a bit. This is really more of a 'class' issue than a racial issue.
  - walshemj 13y ago
    I meant the ratio between the two communitys here. Or are you saying the SF tech companies has a noticeable difference in Indian expats employed compared to SV as whole that is interesting.
    - oblique63 13y ago
      > Or are you saying the SF tech companies has a noticeable difference in Indian expats employed compared to SV as whole that is interesting. Yes, this. And it is interesting. I find that a lot of my Indian colleagues seem to prefer the suburban life of SV to the hustle-and-bustle, 'danger-ridden' streets of SF, but that's purely anecdotal and I doubt it can explain the whole situation. The difference in white/indian ratios between SF and SV is noticeable even from a distance though.
      - walshemj 13y ago
        SF more dangeros than back home :-) Given that my Indian co worker at Reed Elsevier commented that his family had had more than one property take over by "gangsters" not totally sure I buy that. India is quiet a violent country even the sectarian violence in Northern Irland pales in comparison to the recent Muslim / Hindu violence.
cwp 13y ago
So prejudice and hatred are OK, as long as the group you hate isn't marginalized? Or maybe it's a hipster thing? Marginalizing immigrants and transvestites is so 20th century. These techies are getting too big for their britches; time to marginalize them.
- tommorris 13y ago
  Let's see. http://www.civilrights.org/publications/hatecrimes/escalating-violence.html http://www.civilrights.org/publications/hatecrimes/escalatin... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_violence_against_LGBT_people_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_violence_against_LG... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unlawfully_killed_transgender_people https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unlawfully_killed_tran... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynching_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynching_in_the_United_States Ah, but that pales into comparison because someone scrawled "Fuck your startup" in SF.
  - cwp 13y ago
    No, it doesn't. Obviously, actual violence is much worse than graffiti, and antipathy towards tech workers hasn't reached that level. But the fact that other people have it worse doesn't make it right. Update: The root of the issue is that San Francisco has a political problem. The city's voters and politicians can't seem to enact policy to deal with the changes that the city is going through. The influx of tech companies into the city recently is the most visible part of those changes, but they're not the largest part. Rather than looking for scapegoats, San Franciscans should be talking about how to lessen the impact of growth on their way of life.
- oblique63 13y ago
  There is a very real difference between living a well-paid life with some social stigma attached, than having your equal rights denied. Lets not forget that gay marriage is still technically up in limbo right now, and that a large portion of the immigrant community in SF is 'illegal' (whether we like that or not). Quite frankly, being stigmatized for being a techie is not much of a marginalization in comparison. This is largely a privilege/status/class issue, so when talking about marginalization it is important to keep those factors in mind.

supercanuck 13y ago

that was the exact sentence that caused me to leave and check HN comments. If only someone would think of the poor techies! geesh.

walshemj 13y ago

Well in the UK engineers are seen as second class people compare the number of MP's who have a technical background and the average pay in the other professions to engineering. And outside of SV the same is true to an extent in the USA certainly in DC and the corridors of power people with technical backgrounds are rare. And MP like John Robertson (Glasgow North West) who was a LCM for British Telecom before he entered Parliament is very rare. Any congresmen or senators start as a line man for the phone company?

tommorris 13y ago
I'm in the UK. If I'm a second-class citizen qua my being a software engineer, I'd say being a second-class citizen pays pretty fucking well. Let's see: good pay, mostly recession-proof work, often interesting work. Crikey, it's like apartheid South Africa or the Deep South during Jim Crow being in engineering...
- walshemj 13y ago
  Realy when your next in London go to Holbourn and walk into one of the Inns of court and see what the offices of the £2000/ hour barristers look like. Compare a medical Dr with say 15 years experience to an engineer no contest. Or work in the city and have your end customer in fiance say oh I have a pair of shoes that cost more than your entire wardrobe. Just because your paid well compared to a shop assistant doesn't mean the technical people are not second class citizens.
  - tommorris 13y ago
    Here's the difference: the process of becoming a barrister is a long and expensive process that many people fail to complete. Degree, followed by a training course, then you have to try and find a chambers that will accept you, then spend six months to a year doing a pupillage that might cost you more than you make. For at least a year or two, you'd probably make more money as a waiter or shop assistant. And the number of people who try to become a lawyer and fail is pretty high. As for doctors? Have you seen how long medical school takes? It's a long, expensive and arduous journey. In comparison, I make excellent money doing something I mostly enjoy, have no formal qualifications in anything relevant (I've got an MA in Philosophy), never struggle to find work, make enough that I can go out and have fun and so on. Yes, I'm not making £2,000 an hour. I don't particularly care. Does that make a second-class citizen? Absolutely not. (Of course, the fact that I can't legally marry another man actually does make me legally a second-class citizen...) My problem is that any reasonable person outside the tech community would look at the situation we find ourselves in work-wise and think "well, if you enjoy building software, that's a pretty fucking sweet deal". And they're right. Bitching about getting paid a pretty good salary for doing something reasonably enjoyable, having a wide variety of options for work across a variety of sectors... that's pretty fucking whiny and entitled. In this discussion, we started with the comparison by the author of the linked piece of animus towards gentrifying technology workers to the persecution that immigrant and trans people face. The point is this: we do actually get paid quite significantly better than most of society, to do something most of us love. The idea that we're either second class citizens or being persecuted qua being engineers/developers (etc.) is laughable and shows a complete lack of perspective relative to the worst off in society. The idea that animus towards tech workers is in some way analagous to the violence, social disapproval, contempt and often legally-sanctioned persecution that immigrants or trans people face is ridiculous. Should tech workers be paid more? Probably. I certainly wouldn't object if I could double my day rate. Am I a second-class citizen? Absolutely not. I'm getting paid what the market pays for people with my skills and experience. Second class CITIZEN would imply some kind of discrimination or persecution by the state. (Again, like not being able to get married.) Being paid hundreds of pounds a day to write code isn't one of those things.
    - 13y ago

walshemj 13y ago

Well given the proportion of Indian's in the techie community relative to the SF population in general - It is arguably Indirect Racism.

oblique63 13y ago
I've lived in SF my entire life, and I can guarantee you that a vast majority of the tech community here is not Indian. SV is a different story, but in SF it is mostly a 'middle-class' white demographic. If there's any "indirect racism" that's going on, it's probably best encapsulated by what's happened to the mission, but even that would be stretching it a bit. This is really more of a 'class' issue than a racial issue.
- walshemj 13y ago
  I meant the ratio between the two communitys here. Or are you saying the SF tech companies has a noticeable difference in Indian expats employed compared to SV as whole that is interesting.
  - oblique63 13y ago
    > Or are you saying the SF tech companies has a noticeable difference in Indian expats employed compared to SV as whole that is interesting. Yes, this. And it is interesting. I find that a lot of my Indian colleagues seem to prefer the suburban life of SV to the hustle-and-bustle, 'danger-ridden' streets of SF, but that's purely anecdotal and I doubt it can explain the whole situation. The difference in white/indian ratios between SF and SV is noticeable even from a distance though.
    - walshemj 13y ago
      SF more dangeros than back home :-) Given that my Indian co worker at Reed Elsevier commented that his family had had more than one property take over by "gangsters" not totally sure I buy that. India is quiet a violent country even the sectarian violence in Northern Irland pales in comparison to the recent Muslim / Hindu violence.

cwp 13y ago

So prejudice and hatred are OK, as long as the group you hate isn't marginalized? Or maybe it's a hipster thing? Marginalizing immigrants and transvestites is so 20th century. These techies are getting too big for their britches; time to marginalize them.

tommorris 13y ago
Let's see. http://www.civilrights.org/publications/hatecrimes/escalating-violence.html http://www.civilrights.org/publications/hatecrimes/escalatin... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_violence_against_LGBT_people_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_violence_against_LG... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unlawfully_killed_transgender_people https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_unlawfully_killed_tran... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynching_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lynching_in_the_United_States Ah, but that pales into comparison because someone scrawled "Fuck your startup" in SF.
- cwp 13y ago
  No, it doesn't. Obviously, actual violence is much worse than graffiti, and antipathy towards tech workers hasn't reached that level. But the fact that other people have it worse doesn't make it right. Update: The root of the issue is that San Francisco has a political problem. The city's voters and politicians can't seem to enact policy to deal with the changes that the city is going through. The influx of tech companies into the city recently is the most visible part of those changes, but they're not the largest part. Rather than looking for scapegoats, San Franciscans should be talking about how to lessen the impact of growth on their way of life.
oblique63 13y ago
There is a very real difference between living a well-paid life with some social stigma attached, than having your equal rights denied. Lets not forget that gay marriage is still technically up in limbo right now, and that a large portion of the immigrant community in SF is 'illegal' (whether we like that or not). Quite frankly, being stigmatized for being a techie is not much of a marginalization in comparison. This is largely a privilege/status/class issue, so when talking about marginalization it is important to keep those factors in mind.