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> . The most critical things against Pao and her husband I have seen are posts about there phony extortion sexism and racism law suits. What about the subreddi

> . The most critical things against Pao and her husband I have seen are posts about there phony extortion sexism and racism law suits. What about the subreddit comparing Ellen Pao to Pyongyang [0]. Jokes about Pao with over a +4000 positive score [1] [2] Jokes comparing Ellen Pao to Hitler. [3] I remember a post to /r/pics or /r/funny of Hitler's Wikipedia page, with Pao's photo instead of Hitler. I ran into some old coworkers (who take Reddit WAAAY too seriously) at a bar during the weekend this whole thing was first blowing up. They were literally talking about how Pao needs to die. Then they got drunk, forgot they had ranted about her, and told me again how she needed to die. This whole thing was really disgusting and made me hate the average Reddit user. I'll still browse some of the smaller subs, but I won't be touching the frontpage ever again. [0] http://www.reddit.com/r/paoyongyang http://www.reddit.com/r/paoyongyang [1] http://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/3c03y8/ellen_paos_career/ http://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/3c03y8/ellen_paos_car... [2] http://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/3c05wq/what_sound_does_reddit_make_when_it_blows_up/ http://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/3c05wq/what_sound_doe... [3] http://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/3c0b5p/whats_the_difference_between_ellen_pao_and_hitler/ http://www.reddit.com/r/Jokes/comments/3c0b5p/whats_the_diff...

zak_mc_kracken 11y ago
> This whole thing was really disgusting and made me hate the average Reddit user They are not the average Reddit user. Probably a huge majority of Reddit users have no idea who Ellen Pao is.
- zxcvcxz 11y ago
  Sorry you're getting downvoted. Even Ellen Pao claims the racist and misogynist are a small minority.
- estel 11y ago
  Even if that's the case, they're a very visible component of Reddit's userbase, to the point that an outsider definitely might see them as representative. If the default home page and /r/all can all be flooded with posts about her, it's not exactly a small group of extremists.
  - JohnBooty 11y ago
    If the default home page and /r/all can all be flooded with posts about her, it's not exactly a small group of extremists. I don't think the numbers support that statement at all. Reddit has roughly 1.5 million daily users. Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/about/traffic https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/about/traffic It only takes about a thousand (net) upvotes to get something to the front page. So a very small (less than 1%) portion of the visitors can very much get things like "fire Ellen" posts onto the front page, especially when there's no opposing block of voters. (In other words, there were no passionate defenders of Pao who were eagerly downvoting the posts that trashed her. There were only anti-Pao zealots, and a much larger userbase that simply didn't care much at all. Count me in the latter, FWIW.)
Uhhrrr 11y ago
What's wrong with the jokes? Ellen is a grownup and a public figure. Jokes come with the territory. No one is seriously comparing her to Hitler.
- rosser 11y ago
  Just because no-one is literally drawing a moral equivalence between her and Hitler doesn't mean it's not a shitty thing to say, or that you're not a dick for saying it.
  - Uhhrrr 11y ago
    I think you would be a dick to send that joke to /u/ekjp, and it's a bit crass for a dinner party, but it's well within bounds on a pseudonymous forum called "Jokes". Now, I think one could make the argument that /r/Jokes should be more heavily moderated because it's a default sub, and should cater to a more vanilla, easily offended audience.
natmaster 11y ago
What exactly is sexist about comparing someone to Hilter? Would the sexism change if the person being attacked fit under another demographic? Is it OK to criticize say Christopher Columbus because he is a white male. Please enlighten me.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- squeaky-clean 11y ago
  It's not sexist, it's just plain offensive.
  - natmaster 11y ago
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bwGsOBTlhE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bwGsOBTlhE
squeeze 11y ago
The way you make the unfavorable comparisons worse is by taking them seriously. I wouldn't suggest taking those co-workers too seriously either - it probably won't help. Ellen Pao wasn't awful, but all-in-all, it's probably a good thing she stepped down. Hopefully, next time there's a huge community changeover or staff change in reddit, everyone will talk through it and about it reasonably, and everyone will be able to bat away the easily-led and the gleeful and/or bored shit-stirrers.
- geofft 11y ago
  What takeaway should we have about those drunken coworkers? I see roughly three possibilities: * Their comments were funny / reasonable / etc.; there was nothing wrong with them. GP was wrong to find it disgusting. * Their comments were bad, but there's nothing we can do about them. Our society involves it being socially acceptable to tell jokes about how people should die because of their inability to articulate clear moderation policies on a popular website, and that's unfortunate, but there's no way that we'll be able to change that social norm. (Or, alternatively, changing that social norm carries unavoidable downsides.) * Their comments were bad, it's possible to make it no longer socially acceptable to make those jokes, and it should happen. This doesn't really have anything to do with how seriously we take them.
  - axlprose 11y ago
    The 4th option would be to just not assign a moral value to their comments, and chose for yourself as an individual to not let yourself be offended by them. It doesn't mean the co-workers were right, but it doesn't penalize them if the didn't intend to be bad (because doing so would be a slippery slope to thought policing). Unless OP thinks his/her co-workers would face Pao in person and tell her those things, or worse, act on them, then is there any reason to let their silly actions cause you any distress?
    - vehementi 11y ago
      OP did not say he was offended, just disgusted. Like "haha gross, look at these shitty guys". Just like if someone starts making racist remarks, even if I don't personally believe they would murder a black person in the street, I will feel embarrassed for associating with them, and recognize that they are shitty people at the moment, and that is not a slippery slope to thought policing. That is how culture slowly fixes itself.
pavanky 11y ago
Frankly every public figure is compared to Hitler at some point or the other on the internet. There have been pretty personal attacks on Ellen Pao on reddit, but every link you posted here is relatively mild. Similar posts and subreddits were made about Yishan Wong[1] when he was CEO. Hell, reddit also makes fun of little kids[2]. You can not police what people make fun of. The personal attacks and name calling, which haven't been linked in your comments, were a bit much. However they were few and far in between. [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/yishansucks https://www.reddit.com/r/yishansucks [2] https://www.reddit.com/r/fuckcoop https://www.reddit.com/r/fuckcoop
- mintplant 11y ago
  > However they were few and far in between. No they were not. https://www.reddit.com/r/all https://www.reddit.com/r/all was dominated by them for days following the banning of /r/FatPeopleHate.
  - scrollaway 11y ago
    Thanks to bots, yes. You did notice that those 4k+ upvotes posts had somewhere between 0-20 comments in them, right?
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
- cyphunk 11y ago
  > but it's certainly enough to become the loudest voice on the website. This is true of all forms of fundamentalism, off-line or on. and in all cases despite being the minority opinion it generally makes the entire environment they touch suck.
istvan__ 11y ago
What about it? If you are a public figure these are pretty common. On the same ground, would you go an extra mile like this post when somebody comparing donald trump to hitler? Your political bias goes both ways...

zak_mc_kracken 11y ago

> This whole thing was really disgusting and made me hate the average Reddit user They are not the average Reddit user. Probably a huge majority of Reddit users have no idea who Ellen Pao is.

zxcvcxz 11y ago
Sorry you're getting downvoted. Even Ellen Pao claims the racist and misogynist are a small minority.
estel 11y ago
Even if that's the case, they're a very visible component of Reddit's userbase, to the point that an outsider definitely might see them as representative. If the default home page and /r/all can all be flooded with posts about her, it's not exactly a small group of extremists.
- JohnBooty 11y ago
  If the default home page and /r/all can all be flooded with posts about her, it's not exactly a small group of extremists. I don't think the numbers support that statement at all. Reddit has roughly 1.5 million daily users. Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/about/traffic https://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/about/traffic It only takes about a thousand (net) upvotes to get something to the front page. So a very small (less than 1%) portion of the visitors can very much get things like "fire Ellen" posts onto the front page, especially when there's no opposing block of voters. (In other words, there were no passionate defenders of Pao who were eagerly downvoting the posts that trashed her. There were only anti-Pao zealots, and a much larger userbase that simply didn't care much at all. Count me in the latter, FWIW.)

Uhhrrr 11y ago

What's wrong with the jokes? Ellen is a grownup and a public figure. Jokes come with the territory. No one is seriously comparing her to Hitler.

rosser 11y ago
Just because no-one is literally drawing a moral equivalence between her and Hitler doesn't mean it's not a shitty thing to say, or that you're not a dick for saying it.
- Uhhrrr 11y ago
  I think you would be a dick to send that joke to /u/ekjp, and it's a bit crass for a dinner party, but it's well within bounds on a pseudonymous forum called "Jokes". Now, I think one could make the argument that /r/Jokes should be more heavily moderated because it's a default sub, and should cater to a more vanilla, easily offended audience.

natmaster 11y ago

What exactly is sexist about comparing someone to Hilter? Would the sexism change if the person being attacked fit under another demographic? Is it OK to criticize say Christopher Columbus because he is a white male. Please enlighten me.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
squeaky-clean 11y ago
It's not sexist, it's just plain offensive.
- natmaster 11y ago
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bwGsOBTlhE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bwGsOBTlhE

squeeze 11y ago

The way you make the unfavorable comparisons worse is by taking them seriously. I wouldn't suggest taking those co-workers too seriously either - it probably won't help. Ellen Pao wasn't awful, but all-in-all, it's probably a good thing she stepped down. Hopefully, next time there's a huge community changeover or staff change in reddit, everyone will talk through it and about it reasonably, and everyone will be able to bat away the easily-led and the gleeful and/or bored shit-stirrers.

geofft 11y ago
What takeaway should we have about those drunken coworkers? I see roughly three possibilities: * Their comments were funny / reasonable / etc.; there was nothing wrong with them. GP was wrong to find it disgusting. * Their comments were bad, but there's nothing we can do about them. Our society involves it being socially acceptable to tell jokes about how people should die because of their inability to articulate clear moderation policies on a popular website, and that's unfortunate, but there's no way that we'll be able to change that social norm. (Or, alternatively, changing that social norm carries unavoidable downsides.) * Their comments were bad, it's possible to make it no longer socially acceptable to make those jokes, and it should happen. This doesn't really have anything to do with how seriously we take them.
- axlprose 11y ago
  The 4th option would be to just not assign a moral value to their comments, and chose for yourself as an individual to not let yourself be offended by them. It doesn't mean the co-workers were right, but it doesn't penalize them if the didn't intend to be bad (because doing so would be a slippery slope to thought policing). Unless OP thinks his/her co-workers would face Pao in person and tell her those things, or worse, act on them, then is there any reason to let their silly actions cause you any distress?
  - vehementi 11y ago
    OP did not say he was offended, just disgusted. Like "haha gross, look at these shitty guys". Just like if someone starts making racist remarks, even if I don't personally believe they would murder a black person in the street, I will feel embarrassed for associating with them, and recognize that they are shitty people at the moment, and that is not a slippery slope to thought policing. That is how culture slowly fixes itself.

pavanky 11y ago

Frankly every public figure is compared to Hitler at some point or the other on the internet. There have been pretty personal attacks on Ellen Pao on reddit, but every link you posted here is relatively mild. Similar posts and subreddits were made about Yishan Wong[1] when he was CEO. Hell, reddit also makes fun of little kids[2]. You can not police what people make fun of. The personal attacks and name calling, which haven't been linked in your comments, were a bit much. However they were few and far in between. [1] https://www.reddit.com/r/yishansucks https://www.reddit.com/r/yishansucks [2] https://www.reddit.com/r/fuckcoop https://www.reddit.com/r/fuckcoop

mintplant 11y ago
> However they were few and far in between. No they were not. https://www.reddit.com/r/all https://www.reddit.com/r/all was dominated by them for days following the banning of /r/FatPeopleHate.
- scrollaway 11y ago
  Thanks to bots, yes. You did notice that those 4k+ upvotes posts had somewhere between 0-20 comments in them, right?

deleted 11y ago

[deleted]

cyphunk 11y ago
> but it's certainly enough to become the loudest voice on the website. This is true of all forms of fundamentalism, off-line or on. and in all cases despite being the minority opinion it generally makes the entire environment they touch suck.

istvan__ 11y ago

What about it? If you are a public figure these are pretty common. On the same ground, would you go an extra mile like this post when somebody comparing donald trump to hitler? Your political bias goes both ways...