5 ms·

Are people actually outraged? Since when did hacker culture take such a large turn toward political correctness?

by farmerjack 13y ago

chrischen 13y ago
Political correctness is sensitivity to the minority, and is generally not a bad thing.
- metaphorm 13y ago
  there's a difference between appropriate consideration of minorities and over-the-top political correctness. simply put, intent matters and people need to accept that a reflexive hostility towards puerile male humor does not advance the cause of women.
  - Nutella4 13y ago
    Nope, intent isn't magic. http://genderbitch.wordpress.com/2010/01/23/intent-its-fucking-magic/ http://genderbitch.wordpress.com/2010/01/23/intent-its-fucki... And puerile male humor is often intended to drive women away from the boys' club.
    - metaphorm 13y ago
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mens_rea http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mens_rea intent isn't magical but it is legally meaningful. if our laws recognize that intent matters maybe you ought to also.
      - chrischen 13y ago
        So if I drive drunk and mow down a few people... I'm fine as long as I didn't mean to kill people after driving drunk? Intent doesn't always matter, and in this case of puerile humor it doesn't matter. The world could be 99% white, and if I spoke from the perspective of a white person, as if white people are God's gift to humans, I'd be insensitive to the 1% of non-white people. I'd be instilling in the minds of non-white children growing up thinking somehow they are worth less, and are lesser human beings. The whole point of political correctness is that you don't have to actively say negative things about other people, races, or religions to have a negative effect on them. I may not have intended it because of ignorance. I may not have intended it because I have never met a non-white person, and everyone I've met has not been offended by it. But that does not mean my actions are without real consequences to non-white people who happen to hear me when passing by, or from normalizing this action so that later other white people end up adopting this attitude in front of non-white people. The titstare app is pure and simple objectification of women. That 9 year old programmer is coming into an industry and shown that the most interesting thing about her will probably be trumped by her breasts. She's being placed into a culture she can't genuinely adopt (unless she's bisexual or lesbian) because she's not a man. This is alienation. It may not be intentional, but it does have negative effects due to ignorance.
  - roguecoder 13y ago
    "That's treating people with respect gone mad!" If you take away the sexual, objectifying context, the joke's no longer funny. "EyeContact" isn't an app. It really doesn't matters whether they were trying to diminish a class of people's humanity and reinforce the widespread idea that that group's autonomy is subservient to straight men's desires, or if they were just exploiting that dynamic because they were too incompetent, lazy and uncreative to produce something of value and didn't care that the dynamic they were reinforcing is demeaning and harmful. Either way, it's worthy of scorn. "I don't work for the NSA because I want a universal surveillance state: I just work here because it's hilarious when I tell my relatives that I know their shopping lists!" It being a joke doesn't make it better.
deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
USNetizen 13y ago
You had to create a new HN identity to post that? Afraid of something? Hacker culture is no longer a good-ol-boy's club for good reasons. I don't know about you, but I wouldn't feel very included in a culture that denigrated me like certain hacker events of late do to women.
- farmerjack 13y ago
  I didn't have an HN identity. I felt like this might be an interesting discussion, so I created an account. Is it a big secret that men like to look at boobs? I'd like to meet the women who were so offended by such an obvious joke. In the entire circle of women I know, I really can't think of one who wouldn't recognize the playfulness of the idea (and not take it seriously). If a female made an app that included men's butts, would people have the same reaction?
  - memset 13y ago
    "If a female made an app... would people have the same reaction?" Probably not, but that is because men aren't trying to release themselves from the clutches of institutional harassment and marginalization in tech. It isn't like you can just swap the pronouns for your argument - because in doing so, you also swap the historical context and culture, and when you do that then you come to different conclusions.
  - estel 13y ago
    Presenting it at a conference like this reinforces the image of the industry as dominated by white men, and being exactly the sort of really uncomfortable app that can put women off of being a part of the industry. Even if all things were equal, Tits and Sixpack apps would still be all about objectification, and I for one would be fine with that not being encouraged either.
  - oneeyedpigeon 13y ago
    "If a female made an app that included men's butts, would people have the same reaction?" All things being equal, yes. However, men don't have women catcalling at them in the street, don't have to put up with women ogling them in public, get away with more pay for doing exactly the same work, are more likely to rise to positions of power, are favoured by many systems of monarchy, don't have to put up with other people acting as if they own their bodies and have a right to tell them what to do with them, etc, etc, et-bloody-cetera. I like the way that you think only women can possibly be offended by this kind of behaviour. - a man
polemic 13y ago
Yes, people are actually outraged. Because it's outrageous. This isn't "political correctness", this is "how not to shit on the fellow members of our profession". Telling people to Lighten Up[1] is not an adequate excuse for shitty behaviour. 1. http://therealkatie.net/blog/2012/mar/21/lighten-up/ http://therealkatie.net/blog/2012/mar/21/lighten-up/
- farmerjack 13y ago
  The examples in that blog post are discriminatory, and if I were her, I'd be very pissed off. However, the coworkers' comments were directed at her specifically. In this case, it's some men saying they like to stare at boobs. It's not saying women are bad programmers, and it certainly doesn't seem like they're trying to say "men are better than women." If anything, it's saying, "We're dumb males. We like to look at boobs. We made a stupid app to look at more boobs." What bothers me is that, as I read some of these comments, I don't see outraged women but rather a bunch of white knights. This is not a big deal; in this particular case, "lighten up."
  - polemic 13y ago
    The point of the post was not to try to give you examples of discriminatory behaviour (and if you think that's the point of the blog post, you've missed the point entirely). When we, as an industry, create an atmosphere that degrades members of our community, it's not adequate to say "lighten up, it's just a joke, get over it". You seem bothered about who is getting outraged. In my case, I'm a programmer who talks to high school children about careers in technology. Several times I've been in a position where I've told young women: "this attitude exists, I'm sorry, we're trying to change it", and to the young men: "this attitude exists, it's up to you to change it". The 9 year old who presented next to those idiots got a real world taste of the industry she's entering, and I sincerely hope she manages to navigate the waters. In the meantime, I'm vocal because I'm fighting the "lighten up" attitude - your attitude - in a younger generation.
    - Karunamon 13y ago
      I've seen that "lighten up" article posted no less than 4 times in this comment thread, except the unasked elephant in the room appears to be this: At what point precisely does someone's, or a group of someone's comfort factor with a given topic begin to influence whether that topic should be discussed, parodied, subverted, etc? On the left side of that point is where "lighten up" is an acceptable response to someone who is indeed being oversensitive or prudish. This has to be an acceptable response somewhere along this continuum, because the alternative is to censor every single bit of humor ever, because I'm pretty sure I could dig up some person somewhere who is offended by a "why did the chicken cross the road" joke, let alone a reference to sex in any way. On the right side of that point is obvious, where something is clearly and obviously inappropriate and probably damaging. Racial slurs, overtly sexist remarks, etc. So. Where do we draw the line? The fact that this comment thread even exists would tell me that we don't have that nailed down.
prodigal_erik 13y ago
Hacker culture is growing up on stuff like Heinlein articulating non-monogamy and other departures from the mainstream. This is just the plague of the professionally offended drawn in because software is big business now, and the crimethink-seeking drones employers must appoint just to avoid being sued into oblivion.
- roguecoder 13y ago
  Also Heinlein's sexism and completely non-reality-based portrayals of women. Martin Fowler still said it best: "I have a different vision - one that sticks it to the suits so hard it will make their eyes water. How about a community where women are valued for their ability to program and not by the thickness of their skin? How about a community that edgily pushes new boundaries without reinforcing long running evils? Perhaps even a community where women reach equal numbers? Such a community would hand the suits the defeat in the long battle women have been fighting for centuries. I'd love to be part of that."

Are people actually outraged? Since when did hacker culture take such a large turn toward political correctness?

chrischen 13y ago

Political correctness is sensitivity to the minority, and is generally not a bad thing.

metaphorm 13y ago
there's a difference between appropriate consideration of minorities and over-the-top political correctness. simply put, intent matters and people need to accept that a reflexive hostility towards puerile male humor does not advance the cause of women.
- Nutella4 13y ago
  Nope, intent isn't magic. http://genderbitch.wordpress.com/2010/01/23/intent-its-fucking-magic/ http://genderbitch.wordpress.com/2010/01/23/intent-its-fucki... And puerile male humor is often intended to drive women away from the boys' club.
  - metaphorm 13y ago
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mens_rea http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mens_rea intent isn't magical but it is legally meaningful. if our laws recognize that intent matters maybe you ought to also.
    - chrischen 13y ago
      So if I drive drunk and mow down a few people... I'm fine as long as I didn't mean to kill people after driving drunk? Intent doesn't always matter, and in this case of puerile humor it doesn't matter. The world could be 99% white, and if I spoke from the perspective of a white person, as if white people are God's gift to humans, I'd be insensitive to the 1% of non-white people. I'd be instilling in the minds of non-white children growing up thinking somehow they are worth less, and are lesser human beings. The whole point of political correctness is that you don't have to actively say negative things about other people, races, or religions to have a negative effect on them. I may not have intended it because of ignorance. I may not have intended it because I have never met a non-white person, and everyone I've met has not been offended by it. But that does not mean my actions are without real consequences to non-white people who happen to hear me when passing by, or from normalizing this action so that later other white people end up adopting this attitude in front of non-white people. The titstare app is pure and simple objectification of women. That 9 year old programmer is coming into an industry and shown that the most interesting thing about her will probably be trumped by her breasts. She's being placed into a culture she can't genuinely adopt (unless she's bisexual or lesbian) because she's not a man. This is alienation. It may not be intentional, but it does have negative effects due to ignorance.
- roguecoder 13y ago
  "That's treating people with respect gone mad!" If you take away the sexual, objectifying context, the joke's no longer funny. "EyeContact" isn't an app. It really doesn't matters whether they were trying to diminish a class of people's humanity and reinforce the widespread idea that that group's autonomy is subservient to straight men's desires, or if they were just exploiting that dynamic because they were too incompetent, lazy and uncreative to produce something of value and didn't care that the dynamic they were reinforcing is demeaning and harmful. Either way, it's worthy of scorn. "I don't work for the NSA because I want a universal surveillance state: I just work here because it's hilarious when I tell my relatives that I know their shopping lists!" It being a joke doesn't make it better.

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

USNetizen 13y ago

You had to create a new HN identity to post that? Afraid of something? Hacker culture is no longer a good-ol-boy's club for good reasons. I don't know about you, but I wouldn't feel very included in a culture that denigrated me like certain hacker events of late do to women.

farmerjack 13y ago
I didn't have an HN identity. I felt like this might be an interesting discussion, so I created an account. Is it a big secret that men like to look at boobs? I'd like to meet the women who were so offended by such an obvious joke. In the entire circle of women I know, I really can't think of one who wouldn't recognize the playfulness of the idea (and not take it seriously). If a female made an app that included men's butts, would people have the same reaction?
- memset 13y ago
  "If a female made an app... would people have the same reaction?" Probably not, but that is because men aren't trying to release themselves from the clutches of institutional harassment and marginalization in tech. It isn't like you can just swap the pronouns for your argument - because in doing so, you also swap the historical context and culture, and when you do that then you come to different conclusions.
- estel 13y ago
  Presenting it at a conference like this reinforces the image of the industry as dominated by white men, and being exactly the sort of really uncomfortable app that can put women off of being a part of the industry. Even if all things were equal, Tits and Sixpack apps would still be all about objectification, and I for one would be fine with that not being encouraged either.
- oneeyedpigeon 13y ago
  "If a female made an app that included men's butts, would people have the same reaction?" All things being equal, yes. However, men don't have women catcalling at them in the street, don't have to put up with women ogling them in public, get away with more pay for doing exactly the same work, are more likely to rise to positions of power, are favoured by many systems of monarchy, don't have to put up with other people acting as if they own their bodies and have a right to tell them what to do with them, etc, etc, et-bloody-cetera. I like the way that you think only women can possibly be offended by this kind of behaviour. - a man

polemic 13y ago

Yes, people are actually outraged. Because it's outrageous. This isn't "political correctness", this is "how not to shit on the fellow members of our profession". Telling people to Lighten Up[1] is not an adequate excuse for shitty behaviour. 1. http://therealkatie.net/blog/2012/mar/21/lighten-up/ http://therealkatie.net/blog/2012/mar/21/lighten-up/

farmerjack 13y ago
The examples in that blog post are discriminatory, and if I were her, I'd be very pissed off. However, the coworkers' comments were directed at her specifically. In this case, it's some men saying they like to stare at boobs. It's not saying women are bad programmers, and it certainly doesn't seem like they're trying to say "men are better than women." If anything, it's saying, "We're dumb males. We like to look at boobs. We made a stupid app to look at more boobs." What bothers me is that, as I read some of these comments, I don't see outraged women but rather a bunch of white knights. This is not a big deal; in this particular case, "lighten up."
- polemic 13y ago
  The point of the post was not to try to give you examples of discriminatory behaviour (and if you think that's the point of the blog post, you've missed the point entirely). When we, as an industry, create an atmosphere that degrades members of our community, it's not adequate to say "lighten up, it's just a joke, get over it". You seem bothered about who is getting outraged. In my case, I'm a programmer who talks to high school children about careers in technology. Several times I've been in a position where I've told young women: "this attitude exists, I'm sorry, we're trying to change it", and to the young men: "this attitude exists, it's up to you to change it". The 9 year old who presented next to those idiots got a real world taste of the industry she's entering, and I sincerely hope she manages to navigate the waters. In the meantime, I'm vocal because I'm fighting the "lighten up" attitude - your attitude - in a younger generation.
  - Karunamon 13y ago
    I've seen that "lighten up" article posted no less than 4 times in this comment thread, except the unasked elephant in the room appears to be this: At what point precisely does someone's, or a group of someone's comfort factor with a given topic begin to influence whether that topic should be discussed, parodied, subverted, etc? On the left side of that point is where "lighten up" is an acceptable response to someone who is indeed being oversensitive or prudish. This has to be an acceptable response somewhere along this continuum, because the alternative is to censor every single bit of humor ever, because I'm pretty sure I could dig up some person somewhere who is offended by a "why did the chicken cross the road" joke, let alone a reference to sex in any way. On the right side of that point is obvious, where something is clearly and obviously inappropriate and probably damaging. Racial slurs, overtly sexist remarks, etc. So. Where do we draw the line? The fact that this comment thread even exists would tell me that we don't have that nailed down.

prodigal_erik 13y ago

Hacker culture is growing up on stuff like Heinlein articulating non-monogamy and other departures from the mainstream. This is just the plague of the professionally offended drawn in because software is big business now, and the crimethink-seeking drones employers must appoint just to avoid being sued into oblivion.

roguecoder 13y ago
Also Heinlein's sexism and completely non-reality-based portrayals of women. Martin Fowler still said it best: "I have a different vision - one that sticks it to the suits so hard it will make their eyes water. How about a community where women are valued for their ability to program and not by the thickness of their skin? How about a community that edgily pushes new boundaries without reinforcing long running evils? Perhaps even a community where women reach equal numbers? Such a community would hand the suits the defeat in the long battle women have been fighting for centuries. I'd love to be part of that."