4 ms·

See I don't get hatred at Hank, I mean, I did initially read it like that. But when I took a step back I started to see it as hatred of being excluded in a fiel

See I don't get hatred at Hank, I mean, I did initially read it like that. But when I took a step back I started to see it as hatred of being excluded in a field you love. Hatred at the obliviousness of Hank — his inability to realise how vulnerable she felt simply attending a conference because she was in the minority. I think her view of Hank is to disregard him — kind of "Oh he'll be okay, the system's on his side." She doesn't really acknowledge him because it's not about him. We've made it about him because it's so easy for us to empathise with Hank but not with her, which is exactly part of the bias she's upset about.

JimmyM 12y ago
> Oh he'll be okay, the system's on his side. I think Ronson strongly suggests that this is in fact the case. Ronson's a great journalist for acknowledging the complexity of a situation without attempting to offer answers he's unqualified to give, imho. > “So you’re in your new workplace…” (Hank was offered another job right away) “…and you’re talking to a female developer. In what way do you act differently towards her?” > “Well,” Hank said. “We don’t have any female developers at the place I’m working at now. So.” > “You’ve got a new job now, right?” I said to Adria. > “No,” she said. Incidentally thank you for all your comments on this article. They're really thoughtful and have helped me understand what is clearly a very big issue much better.
- IneffablePigeon 12y ago
  Agreed, this article is fantastic and so are interpol_p's comments.
- JibberMeTimbers 12y ago
  You're right but it's still vague. It wasn't made clear on how or if they went about getting new jobs. How many resumes sent out? How many interviews? We don't know what their experience level is...etc...etc. Those questions miss the point of what you are getting at (gender/minority bias) but there is still a technical angle in getting a job.
ernave 12y ago
> being excluded in a field She wasn't being excluded. She wasn't being made fun of. She wasn't being oppressed. If the joke was, "lol that dongle reminds me of penis!" then the only significance of that joke is that it acknowledges the existence of human sexual organs. That's it. That's all it does by itself. All that about being offended and excluded and threatened, that is all baggage that she brought with her into that situation. She imagines that the joke was, "lol that dongle reminds me of penis ...and reminds me that we must continue to oppress all women muhahaha!" That's her imagination. She made that part up. Hank didn't say or imply or even think anything remotely like that. And it doesn't matter if other people share her delusion - any more than it would matter if this was a religious issue and she was claiming someone had committed blasphemy. It doesn't matter that other people share the delusion that god is real.
- interpol_p 12y ago
  > She wasn't being excluded. She wasn't being made fun of. She wasn't being oppressed. Unfortunately that isn't how she felt. Her feelings should matter to us just as Hank's feelings matter. > the only significance of that joke is that it acknowledges the existence of human sexual organs. That's it. No one is arguing that the joke is not innocuous, or that the joke is somehow sinister. I've been in Hank's shoes, I've made stupid jokes about sex. I'm not arguing that Hank deserved any retribution for making that joke. He seems like a really nice guy. It was horrible what happened to him. I'm arguing that there is a problem because someone doesn't feel safe when an innocuous joke is made. And a lack of diversity is the root of this problem. Unfortunately when this topic comes up here we all question Adria's motives, we accuse her and call her delusional. We deny her feelings, and in doing so we exclude her and other women. We make the situation worse. We should be trying to understand how she came to do something so rash and question the culture and environment that brought this horrible situation about. We should give Adria the benefit of the doubt and assume that she is not a monster, then we will see where the real problem lies.
  - mreiland 12y ago
    > Unfortunately that isn't how she felt. Her feelings should matter to us just as Hank's feelings matter. It was unreasonable for her to feel that way and even the author of the article acknowledged that. She can feel however she wants, but she is responsible for herself, no one else is. It is not Hanks' responsibility to make sure she isn't offended by a simple joke. It may have been inappropriate, but that's not the same thing. There was no fairness in what she did.
TeMPOraL 12y ago
> his inability to realise how vulnerable she felt simply attending a conference because she was in the minority Aren't we granting too much power to minorities? Let me tell you a story that happened to me. I once went to a Java developers meetup. I'm a Lisper, probably the only one that was attending, so I was a clear minority (that was 3 years ago, back before everyone jumped onto functional programming bandwagon and started replacing 'A's in their company logos with lambdas, etc.). I actually only went there because my friend was giving a talk about Git. That, and they had free pizza. But I digress. Anyway, there was this guy showing an interesting library for Java, name of which I can't remember now, that was aimed at seriously reducing the amount of cruft and boilerplate one has to write, replacing common patterns with annotations. I thought it was a great idea, and wanted to congratulate him, but suddenly, the entire audience started criticizing. That it's wrong, it's not "the Java way", etc. I voiced my opinion, that it clearly improves readability, for which I heard that I "don't get the Java way of doing things". I think I might also heard someone telling me, "you're a Lisper, this is different, you won't understand". Now should I be offended at that reaction? Well, I felt bad, but should I cry foul, and vent out on the obvious discrimination of concise languages? Should I Tweet about how misolambdic the people on that conference were? How they hate metaprogramming? Should I get someone fired from their job because they told me I'm a Lisper, and thus don't understand Java? I'm a minority after all. I can't even get a job in the field I love, and have to code PHP to earn my bread. I don't think anyone would find affirmative answers to above questions reasonable. And yet in some cases, it's apparently fine to overhear a random joke and turn it into a mess that gets two people fired from their jobs, just because you're a part of a minority. Do we want a society that's afraid of minorities? Because in a way, it validates discrimination - when people see that the smaller group has a disproportional ability to cause damage, it makes people hate them, not welcome them. Moreover, I believe that not being easily offended is the sign of being a mature person. You shouldn't let some passing airwaves upset you to the point of losing control.
- chongli 12y ago
  Aren't we granting too much power to minorities? Why should we be the ones who have the ability to grant power?

JimmyM 12y ago

> Oh he'll be okay, the system's on his side. I think Ronson strongly suggests that this is in fact the case. Ronson's a great journalist for acknowledging the complexity of a situation without attempting to offer answers he's unqualified to give, imho. > “So you’re in your new workplace…” (Hank was offered another job right away) “…and you’re talking to a female developer. In what way do you act differently towards her?” > “Well,” Hank said. “We don’t have any female developers at the place I’m working at now. So.” > “You’ve got a new job now, right?” I said to Adria. > “No,” she said. Incidentally thank you for all your comments on this article. They're really thoughtful and have helped me understand what is clearly a very big issue much better.

IneffablePigeon 12y ago
Agreed, this article is fantastic and so are interpol_p's comments.
JibberMeTimbers 12y ago
You're right but it's still vague. It wasn't made clear on how or if they went about getting new jobs. How many resumes sent out? How many interviews? We don't know what their experience level is...etc...etc. Those questions miss the point of what you are getting at (gender/minority bias) but there is still a technical angle in getting a job.

ernave 12y ago

> being excluded in a field She wasn't being excluded. She wasn't being made fun of. She wasn't being oppressed. If the joke was, "lol that dongle reminds me of penis!" then the only significance of that joke is that it acknowledges the existence of human sexual organs. That's it. That's all it does by itself. All that about being offended and excluded and threatened, that is all baggage that she brought with her into that situation. She imagines that the joke was, "lol that dongle reminds me of penis ...and reminds me that we must continue to oppress all women muhahaha!" That's her imagination. She made that part up. Hank didn't say or imply or even think anything remotely like that. And it doesn't matter if other people share her delusion - any more than it would matter if this was a religious issue and she was claiming someone had committed blasphemy. It doesn't matter that other people share the delusion that god is real.

interpol_p 12y ago
> She wasn't being excluded. She wasn't being made fun of. She wasn't being oppressed. Unfortunately that isn't how she felt. Her feelings should matter to us just as Hank's feelings matter. > the only significance of that joke is that it acknowledges the existence of human sexual organs. That's it. No one is arguing that the joke is not innocuous, or that the joke is somehow sinister. I've been in Hank's shoes, I've made stupid jokes about sex. I'm not arguing that Hank deserved any retribution for making that joke. He seems like a really nice guy. It was horrible what happened to him. I'm arguing that there is a problem because someone doesn't feel safe when an innocuous joke is made. And a lack of diversity is the root of this problem. Unfortunately when this topic comes up here we all question Adria's motives, we accuse her and call her delusional. We deny her feelings, and in doing so we exclude her and other women. We make the situation worse. We should be trying to understand how she came to do something so rash and question the culture and environment that brought this horrible situation about. We should give Adria the benefit of the doubt and assume that she is not a monster, then we will see where the real problem lies.
- mreiland 12y ago
  > Unfortunately that isn't how she felt. Her feelings should matter to us just as Hank's feelings matter. It was unreasonable for her to feel that way and even the author of the article acknowledged that. She can feel however she wants, but she is responsible for herself, no one else is. It is not Hanks' responsibility to make sure she isn't offended by a simple joke. It may have been inappropriate, but that's not the same thing. There was no fairness in what she did.

TeMPOraL 12y ago

> his inability to realise how vulnerable she felt simply attending a conference because she was in the minority Aren't we granting too much power to minorities? Let me tell you a story that happened to me. I once went to a Java developers meetup. I'm a Lisper, probably the only one that was attending, so I was a clear minority (that was 3 years ago, back before everyone jumped onto functional programming bandwagon and started replacing 'A's in their company logos with lambdas, etc.). I actually only went there because my friend was giving a talk about Git. That, and they had free pizza. But I digress. Anyway, there was this guy showing an interesting library for Java, name of which I can't remember now, that was aimed at seriously reducing the amount of cruft and boilerplate one has to write, replacing common patterns with annotations. I thought it was a great idea, and wanted to congratulate him, but suddenly, the entire audience started criticizing. That it's wrong, it's not "the Java way", etc. I voiced my opinion, that it clearly improves readability, for which I heard that I "don't get the Java way of doing things". I think I might also heard someone telling me, "you're a Lisper, this is different, you won't understand". Now should I be offended at that reaction? Well, I felt bad, but should I cry foul, and vent out on the obvious discrimination of concise languages? Should I Tweet about how misolambdic the people on that conference were? How they hate metaprogramming? Should I get someone fired from their job because they told me I'm a Lisper, and thus don't understand Java? I'm a minority after all. I can't even get a job in the field I love, and have to code PHP to earn my bread. I don't think anyone would find affirmative answers to above questions reasonable. And yet in some cases, it's apparently fine to overhear a random joke and turn it into a mess that gets two people fired from their jobs, just because you're a part of a minority. Do we want a society that's afraid of minorities? Because in a way, it validates discrimination - when people see that the smaller group has a disproportional ability to cause damage, it makes people hate them, not welcome them. Moreover, I believe that not being easily offended is the sign of being a mature person. You shouldn't let some passing airwaves upset you to the point of losing control.

chongli 12y ago
Aren't we granting too much power to minorities? Why should we be the ones who have the ability to grant power?