The author is obviously self-aware and this is precisely what makes it frustrating. Nearly every point is obfuscated through ornamentation, or broken up into parenthetical statements like a jigsaw puzzle. The entire article could be summarized in a concise paragraph with minimal loss of meaning. It's just pretension.
This writing style is itself a performance of Rationalist culture. Read anything by The Last Psychiatrist or Scott Alexander or Eliezer Yudkowsky for comparison.
I actually double-checked to make sure I wasn't on Yudkowsky's site.
Move to Seattle from Atlanta and quickly got sick of people up here talking about how racist it must be in Atlanta.
This particular point has always been a bit funny to me. I mean, sure, there are super racist areas in the south. I grew up and lived in mostly rural Alabama for the first 20+ years of my life, and there were some rural areas that were just as terrible as people imagine (cross burnings, open Klan meetings, etc, though that was starting to die down in the last 10 years or so I lived there). That said, a lot of cities…
I talked to a lot more black programmers in meetups in Atlanta than I have in San Francisco (I'm not American and was a visitor in both places) & was surprised by how biased against the former people in the latter were, despite evidence to the contrary.
Is it really? I see this written on HN all the time, but of everyone I know who tried to find a remote job failed. The people who ended up working remotely are the ones who worked in the office for many years and gained the trust of their employer. Then when the family moved (usually due to a spouse changing jobs) the employer decided to let them work remotely rather than letting them go, at least in the near term.
> The people who ended up working remotely are the ones who worked in the office for many years and gained the trust of their employer. Well yes pretty much this. I worked for a year on-premises before switching to remote, and I can imagine it's harder to find remote work from the get-go.
I've had many remote jobs (including current). Another option is to start as a (remote) freelancer / consultant and transition to normal full-time while remaining remote.
I haven't finished the article yet, but one thing that strikes me is the flamboyant use of vocabulary. Given the topic, I'm not sure whether it's just a peculiarity of the author, an attempt to tailor the reception of the piece with regard to specific audiences, a slight trolling or the reader, or a combination thereof. For example, early on we get "impecunious" and "shibboleths", followed up shortly afterwards with…
You ask in another comment whether you are oblivious. Playfully, I respond "Yes, you are oblivious". Using "shibboleth" as a shibboleth is itself a shibboleth. She's declaring her bona fides (gratuitous Latin is also a shibboleth, especially if highlighted with italics) as a scholar by demonstrating her ability to use an obscure term correctly, and is being gracious to her audience by assuming their comprehension. Sw…
Cognizant of your tone, it seems those twobuckn'fifty words are turning a perfectly clear statement into the written equivalent of caramel toffee. It's not terrible, but sticky to chew through. Ain't a college essay with a 500 word cap, spaces are cheap and plenty.
Ploughing as many 7 syllable words as possible into a sentence makes an author seem...self-conscious about tone. Strunk & White says "Omit Needless Words". I've always taken that as "Omit Needless Ornament". Thrice nested sentences, v̶e̶r̶b̶i̶a̶g̶e̶ ̶o̶b̶s̶c̶u̶r̶a̶ o̶b̶s̶c̶u̶r̶e̶ ̶v̶o̶c̶a̶b̶u̶l̶a̶r̶y̶ big words, flowery language, et cetera.
The authors family sought to raise their blue collar class to a higher one. I have for years thought of a non-profit that might do this by sponsoring children into music instrument lessons, horseback riding, and language lessons. Things that most (say 75% of people) cannot afford. This could be done in group lessons to save on cost.
I don't think it's simply a "can't afford" issue. If the parents don't make a conscious, long-term effort (like in the author's case), you risk a huge blowback from them when the kids start acting "strangely". Nerds get bullied in school for being different than jocks; imagine having that happen with everyone you encounter, including your parents.
Because of where I grew up (rural South and Appalachia), my native accent is something that I've learned to mask in all professional settings. It doesn't matter how immaculate my grammar is: in the profession of software engineering, southern accent = ignorant bigot who can't be trusted. People's biases, conscious or otherwise, are noticeable. The irony is that I practice "code switching", so basically my coworkers h…
Seattle is wildly bigoted against Southerners. Wildly. It's a real problem.
And remember: if he had encountered a black civilian at that moment, the civilian would not have escaped with his life.
That's doubtful--- it's young white men who tend to execute mass-shootings, and the officer in question knew he was responding to a mass shooting.
While you are right that gender is a very strong predictor, you are wrong about race, according to CNN[1].
> white people ... committed some 64% of the shootings ... Black people committed close to 16% ... Asians were responsible for around 9% ... Latinos are almost nowhere to be seen
> whites and blacks are pretty proportionate to their population
> Is it possible that your friends are actually right? In being oblivious to a well-documented phenomenon? That's not very likely. Obliviousness to class is a class marker for middle class. Major values of the middle class are equal opportunity and meritocracy, but existing class structures prevent that, so the middle class stick their heads in the ground and pretend that the upper classes have earned their position…
That is ... remarkably classist of you.
It's funny how a discussion about social classes turns out this way. Downvotes instead of an actual non-vague response? Pssshhhh......
Because of where I grew up (rural South and Appalachia), my native accent is something that I've learned to mask in all professional settings. It doesn't matter how immaculate my grammar is: in the profession of software engineering, southern accent = ignorant bigot who can't be trusted. People's biases, conscious or otherwise, are noticeable. The irony is that I practice "code switching", so basically my coworkers h…
Duuuude! Me too all the way... Except I don't change my accent. I just fuck with people and their stupid biases... I tell the truth, and when people are sacarcastic I take it all literally on purpose... And I make them explain everything, especially their stupid jokes!!! Oh man I love making people explain their stupid jokes to me. My favorite thing to say is, "I don't get it?" Or "yeaaah, I'm a literalist. I don't get sarcasm." ....and if the conversation hasn't turned to something real and interesting by this point and right when they're fedup and ready and to walk away and dissmis me... That's when I tell them I'm fucking with them in my best voice impression of theirs. It's all about vetting and breaking social facades. Most people and especially in tech were abussed by their peers as kids. They learned early on to judge and dismiss. You can't take it too personally and you always have to be ready to fight. The key is to come from a place of humility and not to be mean. Otherwise you'll just add to the problem and growing cultural divide. Oh yeah I'm from Oklahoma, I had a speech impediment as a kid so they tell me. I was beat up or confronted nearly every day in school by people who were afraid and didn't understand me. It didn't help that I went to school in the poorest school in town, that was also the most racially/culturally diverse school... And my mom was an administrator there. So all the worst kids had beaf with me because of my mom. But one of the best lessons I ever learned was "fuck the dumb shit"... This goes for all things in life.
Back in the middle ages, when the French conquered Britain, the ruling class spoke French and the peasants spoke English. A lot of French words flowed into English as a result. But even today, if people use the words of French origin rather than the old English words, one is regarded as being from the upper class, such as using 'purchase' instead of 'buy'. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_English_words_of_Frenc.…
The tendency to use "fancier" vocabulary has actually been noted as a tendency of the non-Upper class. Cf. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/U_and_non-U_English
Absolutely! I'd like to add, high culture is also used as a term for cultures that are insular and use lots of culturally specific vocabulary. The Southern Culture and accent is actually considered high culture by many anthropologists! By the same token... So is tech culture... Even when it's really annoying stupid fat lazy and mysogonistic and repeating the same problems in a different language that were solved before computers were even invented!!! Wrap your head around that one!