5 ms·

If "everyone else is white" then why should they catter to the non-white demographic? Should they spoil everyone's fun to make a minority feel "included"? I un

by rmk2 13y ago

If "everyone else is white" then why should they catter to the non-white demographic? Should they spoil everyone's fun to make a minority feel "included"? I understand that the STATED purpose of the event is not "being white". But an unstated and real consideration for people attending is the opportunity of being with one or several white friends. Not everything operates on the "stated" level. A better way would be to have several types of such events, cattered to the different demographics. And if some demographic is not big enough to organize one, well, sometimes in life your tastes are different than most people's and you have to accept that. caveat: to cater

jiggy2011 13y ago
This isn't really the same thing, you can't please all of the people all of the time. You could be as try and offer as diverse activities as you like, say drinking/sports/chess tournament and there is likely to be someone who doesn't like any of those things. A "whites only" restaurant is a different thing entirely to a restaurant where you're not thrilled about the menu.
- rmk2 13y ago
  Sure, but it does matter how you present your argument, and that's not at all what the GP expressed, even if it might have been the intended meaning.
  - coldtea 13y ago
    Well, since I talked specifically about a PERSONAL behavior (drinking) to be ALLOWED (it's a fucking personal choice), instead of people to be excluded because of their COLOR, I'm pretty sure I didn't expressed anything like the BS racism argument above.
lmm 13y ago
Sarcasm is the lowest form of argument. Go on, expand it out: what are the reasons why that would be a bad thing? Do these reasons also apply to the view in the grandparent post? If so, argue with those reasons.
- rmk2 13y ago
  My bad.[1] The computing world isn't the most inclusive to begin with, and by additionally alienating parts of the audience that hasn't already been excluded on other grounds (gender, race), none of this gets any better. Conferences carry a lot of symbolic power, because they are representative of a given community, moreso than a forum or a mailing list, where some voices will always be louder than others. The conferences, then, have the onus on them to accommodate a wider audience of people; they also have the chance to shape their respective communities. By creating what has been described by others as "fret party" environments, these communities severly curtail their wider appeal. It also doesn't help the image of programming being a non-respectable profession. If you behave like and cater to the "frat-bros", expect to be treated like one. Most academic conferences seem to handle this better, with drinks receptions, dinners or evening programme separated from the actual conference content. If alcohol is served, that usually means sparkling wine and/or wine, with juices as alternative. Additionally, conference proceedings and drinking are strictly separated. I think the conference dinner, as a whole, is a better format, because it still enables you to chat to other attendees, but since everybody is already eating together and thus connected by a common activity, drinking doesn't have to be the one thing connecting everybody. Whether somebody then has a drink with their meal or not doesn't matter so much. [1]: This might be sarcasm.
lost_my_pwd 13y ago
People can choose to drink or not whereas race is not a choice.
onetwofiveten 13y ago
This is a silly analogy. Racism causes serious damage to people's lives. Participating in racial discrimination perpetuates racist attitudes and that is why all forms of racial discrimination that negatively affect minorities are seen as morally wrong in our society. ("Positive" racial discrimination is not seen as bad - see the Focus 100 hackathon.) It is not quite the same to cater strongly for people who drink versus those who don't. I like to drink, so I tend to choose friends who also like to drink. There's nothing wrong with that. It would be very different if I only had white friends because I disliked non-white people. I'm not saying it wouldn't be more professional to be more inclusive with regards non-drinkers, I just think this analogy trivialises the issue of racial discrimination.
- rmk2 13y ago
  It's not an analogy, it shows the questionable wording of the GP's claim, which, with minimal adaption, can be made into quite a different argument with a rather different feel to it. The whole point is that words and implications matter, in much the same way as the implication of "hacker culture == alcohol" matters. A potentially sensible point thus resembles a style of language that does all but helf reinforce the argument.
coldtea 13y ago
If you're making "drinking at an event" to amount to "racism", then you're doing your argument a disservice and you probably don't know what racism is. Worse, if this logic is accepted it sets up a hellish society, were that a few people don't like something would mean they can force the many who like it to cease it. Notice how he doesn't ask for his right NOT to drink -- he asks that OTHERS do not drink because he doesn't like it. That's like the inverse of democracy: the minorities clamp each other until everyone's not getting what they want. Didn't we have that with the marijuana laws and sodomy laws already?Wait, we even tried it for drinking, during the prohibition. How did that turn out?

by rmk2 13y ago

jiggy2011 13y ago

This isn't really the same thing, you can't please all of the people all of the time. You could be as try and offer as diverse activities as you like, say drinking/sports/chess tournament and there is likely to be someone who doesn't like any of those things. A "whites only" restaurant is a different thing entirely to a restaurant where you're not thrilled about the menu.

rmk2 13y ago
Sure, but it does matter how you present your argument, and that's not at all what the GP expressed, even if it might have been the intended meaning.
- coldtea 13y ago
  Well, since I talked specifically about a PERSONAL behavior (drinking) to be ALLOWED (it's a fucking personal choice), instead of people to be excluded because of their COLOR, I'm pretty sure I didn't expressed anything like the BS racism argument above.

lmm 13y ago

Sarcasm is the lowest form of argument. Go on, expand it out: what are the reasons why that would be a bad thing? Do these reasons also apply to the view in the grandparent post? If so, argue with those reasons.

rmk2 13y ago
My bad.[1] The computing world isn't the most inclusive to begin with, and by additionally alienating parts of the audience that hasn't already been excluded on other grounds (gender, race), none of this gets any better. Conferences carry a lot of symbolic power, because they are representative of a given community, moreso than a forum or a mailing list, where some voices will always be louder than others. The conferences, then, have the onus on them to accommodate a wider audience of people; they also have the chance to shape their respective communities. By creating what has been described by others as "fret party" environments, these communities severly curtail their wider appeal. It also doesn't help the image of programming being a non-respectable profession. If you behave like and cater to the "frat-bros", expect to be treated like one. Most academic conferences seem to handle this better, with drinks receptions, dinners or evening programme separated from the actual conference content. If alcohol is served, that usually means sparkling wine and/or wine, with juices as alternative. Additionally, conference proceedings and drinking are strictly separated. I think the conference dinner, as a whole, is a better format, because it still enables you to chat to other attendees, but since everybody is already eating together and thus connected by a common activity, drinking doesn't have to be the one thing connecting everybody. Whether somebody then has a drink with their meal or not doesn't matter so much. [1]: This might be sarcasm.

lost_my_pwd 13y ago

People can choose to drink or not whereas race is not a choice.

onetwofiveten 13y ago

This is a silly analogy. Racism causes serious damage to people's lives. Participating in racial discrimination perpetuates racist attitudes and that is why all forms of racial discrimination that negatively affect minorities are seen as morally wrong in our society. ("Positive" racial discrimination is not seen as bad - see the Focus 100 hackathon.) It is not quite the same to cater strongly for people who drink versus those who don't. I like to drink, so I tend to choose friends who also like to drink. There's nothing wrong with that. It would be very different if I only had white friends because I disliked non-white people. I'm not saying it wouldn't be more professional to be more inclusive with regards non-drinkers, I just think this analogy trivialises the issue of racial discrimination.

rmk2 13y ago
It's not an analogy, it shows the questionable wording of the GP's claim, which, with minimal adaption, can be made into quite a different argument with a rather different feel to it. The whole point is that words and implications matter, in much the same way as the implication of "hacker culture == alcohol" matters. A potentially sensible point thus resembles a style of language that does all but helf reinforce the argument.

coldtea 13y ago

If you're making "drinking at an event" to amount to "racism", then you're doing your argument a disservice and you probably don't know what racism is. Worse, if this logic is accepted it sets up a hellish society, were that a few people don't like something would mean they can force the many who like it to cease it. Notice how he doesn't ask for his right NOT to drink -- he asks that OTHERS do not drink because he doesn't like it. That's like the inverse of democracy: the minorities clamp each other until everyone's not getting what they want. Didn't we have that with the marijuana laws and sodomy laws already?Wait, we even tried it for drinking, during the prohibition. How did that turn out?